Hello,
I have a very challenging and annoying electrical noise problem that I believe is traceable to either my PC's power supply, motherboard, or processor. I hope some knowledgeable and helpful experts out there can help me figure out what to do next. Unfortunately, I don't have other power supplies, motherboards, or unlimited funds to drop and swap until the noise is gone. I need to carefully consider my best option(s) and go one step at a time. Here's the story:
Last month I built a new Intel i7 PC for music composition and audio recording. Everything was going great until I tried recording line-level analog audio from my hardware synthesizers. My i7 PC has an M-Audio Delta 1010 sound card (external A/D converter box) that was previously used in a Pentium III PC and made pristine recordings in that role. To my horror, analog recordings into this new i7 PC are accompanied by an obnoxious, wide-spectrum buzzing noise centered near 2.5kHz. This electrical noise is very obviously audible in .wav files recorded on this i7 PC.
Fortunately, I was able to reduce the noise by 8dB by disabling Speedstep in my bios as noted in this thread (ironically, these people cite acoustic noise whereas this helped reduce my electrical/audio noise). After this solution, however, the noise is still audible and needs further reduction/elimination for these recordings to be up to par.
http://forum.corsair.com/forums/showthread.php?t=75330.
A further solution is having my Delta 1010 A/D breakout box powered by a rackmount Furman power conditioner (RP-8). Supposedly these units have AC filtering circuitry within, and sure enough, placing this unit between the A/D box and the AC wall plug reduced the recorded electrical noise by another 2dB. But that's still not good enough - it's still audible, albeit at a low level.
So I have a few older PCs that have been reliable for pristine audio recordings for many years - one of which is a humble Toshiba 1.4GHz Pentium M laptop with an RME Hammerfall PCMCIA sound card (Multiface external A/D box). I repeated these recording tests using this old laptop with the following two conditions: new i7 powered OFF and i7 PC powered ON.
With the i7 PC merely powered ON (keep in mind, there are no connections between these 2 PCs.. and the synthesizer is being recorded directly into the Hammerfall A/D inputs.. so the only common link is that they both are drawing AC power..), the laptop records the SAME ELECTRICAL NOISE as originally found/noted in the i7 recordings (at a slightly lower level)!
With the i7 PC powered off, however, the laptop audio recordings were pristine as expected - no noise whatsover.
Therefore, this electrical noise is making its way from the i7 PC and into my other audio gear via my home's AC power path.
My question for the experts that know PCs, power supplies, motherboards, and AC: how should I go about eliminating this noise? What's my next best step?
(FWIW, Antec customer support recommended that I update my motherboard bios, which I promptly did, and found no improvement/change in my recording tests).
If the root cause is the i7 CPU, would switching to a different CPU be the best solution? For example, would I find solace in an Intel Core 2 Quad or AMD Phenom II CPU?
Or, is it the Gigabyte motherboard that needs to be swapped out? Isn't it the motherboard's job to filter and control the emissions of noisy chips? But isn't Gigabyte well-known as the best motherboard manufacturer out there? What could I try that would make a difference - Asus? Foxconn?
Or, is the PC power supply at fault? If I simply bought a much more expensive power supply, would I also buy better DC -> AC filtering? Is there a specific power supply model out there designed to handle the i7 and keep its noise within the PC?
Sorry for the long post, but there is a bit to consider. Your thoughts, comments, and questions would be most welcome. Here are my PC specs:
CPU: Intel i7 920 2.6 GHz
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-EX58-UD4P
RAM: Super Talent 6GB DDR3
GPU: Sapphire Radeon HD4770
HD: Western Digital WD10000LSRTL
DVD: Sony AD-7240S-0B
PS: Antec Earthwatts 430W
Case: Antec Sonata Elite
Sound: M-Audio Delta 1010
Thanks,
Scott
I have a very challenging and annoying electrical noise problem that I believe is traceable to either my PC's power supply, motherboard, or processor. I hope some knowledgeable and helpful experts out there can help me figure out what to do next. Unfortunately, I don't have other power supplies, motherboards, or unlimited funds to drop and swap until the noise is gone. I need to carefully consider my best option(s) and go one step at a time. Here's the story:
Last month I built a new Intel i7 PC for music composition and audio recording. Everything was going great until I tried recording line-level analog audio from my hardware synthesizers. My i7 PC has an M-Audio Delta 1010 sound card (external A/D converter box) that was previously used in a Pentium III PC and made pristine recordings in that role. To my horror, analog recordings into this new i7 PC are accompanied by an obnoxious, wide-spectrum buzzing noise centered near 2.5kHz. This electrical noise is very obviously audible in .wav files recorded on this i7 PC.
Fortunately, I was able to reduce the noise by 8dB by disabling Speedstep in my bios as noted in this thread (ironically, these people cite acoustic noise whereas this helped reduce my electrical/audio noise). After this solution, however, the noise is still audible and needs further reduction/elimination for these recordings to be up to par.
http://forum.corsair.com/forums/showthread.php?t=75330.
A further solution is having my Delta 1010 A/D breakout box powered by a rackmount Furman power conditioner (RP-8). Supposedly these units have AC filtering circuitry within, and sure enough, placing this unit between the A/D box and the AC wall plug reduced the recorded electrical noise by another 2dB. But that's still not good enough - it's still audible, albeit at a low level.
So I have a few older PCs that have been reliable for pristine audio recordings for many years - one of which is a humble Toshiba 1.4GHz Pentium M laptop with an RME Hammerfall PCMCIA sound card (Multiface external A/D box). I repeated these recording tests using this old laptop with the following two conditions: new i7 powered OFF and i7 PC powered ON.
With the i7 PC merely powered ON (keep in mind, there are no connections between these 2 PCs.. and the synthesizer is being recorded directly into the Hammerfall A/D inputs.. so the only common link is that they both are drawing AC power..), the laptop records the SAME ELECTRICAL NOISE as originally found/noted in the i7 recordings (at a slightly lower level)!
With the i7 PC powered off, however, the laptop audio recordings were pristine as expected - no noise whatsover.
Therefore, this electrical noise is making its way from the i7 PC and into my other audio gear via my home's AC power path.
My question for the experts that know PCs, power supplies, motherboards, and AC: how should I go about eliminating this noise? What's my next best step?
(FWIW, Antec customer support recommended that I update my motherboard bios, which I promptly did, and found no improvement/change in my recording tests).
If the root cause is the i7 CPU, would switching to a different CPU be the best solution? For example, would I find solace in an Intel Core 2 Quad or AMD Phenom II CPU?
Or, is it the Gigabyte motherboard that needs to be swapped out? Isn't it the motherboard's job to filter and control the emissions of noisy chips? But isn't Gigabyte well-known as the best motherboard manufacturer out there? What could I try that would make a difference - Asus? Foxconn?
Or, is the PC power supply at fault? If I simply bought a much more expensive power supply, would I also buy better DC -> AC filtering? Is there a specific power supply model out there designed to handle the i7 and keep its noise within the PC?
Sorry for the long post, but there is a bit to consider. Your thoughts, comments, and questions would be most welcome. Here are my PC specs:
CPU: Intel i7 920 2.6 GHz
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-EX58-UD4P
RAM: Super Talent 6GB DDR3
GPU: Sapphire Radeon HD4770
HD: Western Digital WD10000LSRTL
DVD: Sony AD-7240S-0B
PS: Antec Earthwatts 430W
Case: Antec Sonata Elite
Sound: M-Audio Delta 1010
Thanks,
Scott
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