Question / Help Buzzing / mechanical hissing in headphones when OBS is open

[betawarz]

Hi folks,

I will briefly describe my hardware configuration and then describe my issue.

I use OBS as part of a two PC streaming setup. I have my gaming PC and my streaming PC both as audio inputs into an analog audio mixer. I have my headphones plugged into the mixer. I listen to audio from both my gaming PC and streaming PC using those headphones, via the mixer. The mixer produces two outputs - my microphone audio and the main mix for the stream, which excludes the mic audio. These outputs from the mixer go into the streaming PC for OBS to use. I run OBS on my streaming PC. My main OBS scene has three audio sources - my mic, the audio from gaming PC and lastly the desktop audio from streaming PC.

That's a bit about my physical hardware and software setup. It really is just a long winded way of describing your basic two PC streaming setup.

The issue I'm facing is that whenever I open OBS, on my streaming PC, there is a mechanical hissing sound, or buzzing perhaps. Not quite sure how to describe other than high pitched and mechanical sounding. Kind of like your ears are ringing.

This sound is only present when OBS is running. If I close OBS the sound stops. When I re-open OBS the sound starts again.

The sound persists regardless of what I do in OBS. I tried muting all audio sources. I disabled the video preview. I've tried a blank scene. Nothing causes the sound to go away, outside of closing OBS.

Does anybody have a clue what could be causing OBS to produce this sound?

Thanks!

 

[vapeahoy]

I would start by disabling components to rule out things. Disable 1 and 1 component in bios as much as u can.
If nothing helps try raising cpu voltage, increase LLC, try other memory etc.

 

[betawarz]

@vapeahoy do you know of any software or methods of testing various things, beyond just removing hardware? the machine I'm running OBS on really has no hardware that I can remove and still boot into windows to test OBS with. it's a pretty minimal machine and I don't have spare parts to swap with, for example graphics card and ram.

I installed OBS on my gaming PC, which feeds audio into the same mixer as streaming PC. Running OBS on gaming PC does not cause the same audio issue. It's only happening on steaming PC. I'm sure it's something hardware related, but I'm not sure what would cause it. After some googling, some folks seemed to suggest it might have to do with fluctuating voltage, or sharing same power source as the mixer. Everything of mine feeds into a UPS, though, so it shouldn't affect other hardware's voltages, etc.

 

[betawarz]

@Harold You helped me out about a year ago with a motherboard related solution for OBS. You had a really methodical and analytical approach to debugging OBS related issues, I felt like.

Do you have any idea or clue as to how to go about figuring out why OBS causes a high pitch frequency audio in my headphones?

I'm looking at voltages and clock speeds, with CPUID HWMonitor, but everything looks pretty stock. I've got all overclocking, etc, disabled. I've got my processor manufacturer page open, and it looks like I'm running at their stock clock speed, etc.

https://ark.intel.com/products/77780/Intel-Core-i7-4930K-Processor-12M-Cache-up-to-3_90-GHz

 

[betawarz]

Some more debugging points ...

I think it has to do with power, or something.

So, my streaming PC (OBS) feeds audio into my mixer via USB. If I disable the audio driver on the streaming PC, which means no audio is going from streaming PC to mixer, I can still hear the sound when I open OBS.

That sort of tells me it's something power related making it from the streaming PC into my mixer and into my headphones.

Does this sound logical to anybody else?

 

[betawarz]

Some more debugging info (this has become more of a journal of my own various things I've tested at this point) ...

It sounds dumb and obvious, but if I unplug the USB cable that goes from streaming PC to mixer, the sound goes away. This at least rules out perhaps something relating to power sockets, UPS, etc.

It definitely is audio coming over the USB line.

Not a bad USB cord. I've tested with multiple cords.

I've tested various USB sockets on PC, all make same sound.

 

[betawarz]

OK.

It's not OBS. It's the PC, motherboard, the mixer, or something.

If I go into Windows' own recording devices, and select properties on the mixer and change through various sample rate and bit depth I can hear the sound come and go.

So it has something to do with that - not OBS.

 

[vapeahoy]

My first thought was undervoltage for a or some or all of cpu's power states. I initially wrote a rather lengthy post but decided to not go thru with it.
F.ex if i set the initial voltage for a cpu core to be too low, it can seem just fine, till a certain scenario appears or over time, a weird sound appears when running anything that renders 3d, even when not rendering but simply puts the system in a "performance" mode. I had that problem when i had too low voltage. I incrementally increased it till i found a setting that no longer could cough up the artifact sound issue over time. Havent had the problem in weeks so must be working ok, result is a colder cpu. Still could tweak it some more tho but thats another story.

I do currently have a problem with one sound card here, but its simply because its so capable the output volume is just sheer staggering for my intended usage, or its actually in part defect too.
I did recently have another soundcard that would work just fine, as long as it had extra usb power cable connected, but its supposed to work just fine with only regular usb cable.
Ie it worked just fine, apparently, but not really.

You can stress test memory with prime95, custom test, minimum 448k ff, max default, rest default except set to 75% of max memory. Test cpu with prime95 small fft works great. Passmark memtest works also great.

For me starting GTA V is a very good test for seeing if voltages are too low, even if they're stable benchmark wise.
You might have heard of the phenomenon gpu coil whine, well gpu's arent the only thing that can have such working issues. It may sound silly, but if u consider that the game also then needs you to use usb devices at the same time etc, idk, it works great for me. not that i really like the game or anything.

Always find the lowest stable working NB/chipset voltage, as with any voltage, a bit too much voltage is fine, so you have some working room. Set everything voltage manually is probably what i'd recommend u do first.

 

[vapeahoy]

Ie to be clear, it sounds like static build up or its an case of power requirements not being met.

 

[AJ CoRe TV]

same issue. any input like typing or opening apps causes the buzz in my headphones. but opening OBS keeps it on full buzz

 

[AJ CoRe TV]

Just fixed it! use a Groud Loop isolator plug into the WaveXLR interface 3.5mm headphone out (which then goes into my wireless headset basestation line in)and BOOM cleeannnnn :)