Cracking sounds playing randomly over playback - HyperOS

[PedroCO]

Hi guys hope you're having a good day.
Recently i just bought my new POCO M6 PRO after 4 years using my LG G7, went on and installed Poweramp EQ before updating to HyperOS and everything worked normally, but after the update suddenly random cracking noises started happening everytime i played music from Spotifiy, doesn't matter if my screen is on or off, I also activated "advanced player detection" and the problem still happens with Tidal, and stops after turning off the EQ processing.

I was wondering if this has to do with the recent update, maybe something weird going on under the hood you guys haven't discover yet due to the short lifetime of the update?

I'm planning on downgrading my device back to MIUI 14 (that's how important i find the EQ app for my listening experience), but since that comes with voiding my warranty on my new device first i want to try and solve this problem by exausting all toubleshooting options, hope you guys can help me.

 

THINGS I'VE DONE TO TRY AND SOLVE THIS PROBLEM:

• Exclude EQ and players from battery optimizations
• Turn off DVC (in fact, this worsens the problem, having cracking all over the playback, not just sometimes)
• Turn on Autostart on EQ and players
• turn on and off multiservice detection
• uninstall and re-install players and EQ
• turn on Always On Display (to see if this keeps the screen on and increases in some way CPU power?¿?¿)
• Of course, restarting/turning off my device
• Trying diferent levels of pre-amp (+0, -0, 0)
• Swapping between parametric and graphic equalizer
• Turning off tone
• Clearing cache
• Placing the widgets on the main screen
• Locking apps from being cleared from "clear all apps" on active tasks
• changing block size lower and higher
• Limiter ON/OFF
• Turned off "pause activity if unused" on players and EQ
• Turned on all options on "other permissions" for all apps
• Turned off and on Dobly Atmos
• Turned off and on "normalize volume" on player apps

This problem happens randomly, could happen when i start playing a new song, when i change track, when i lock or unlock my screen, could happen after 30 seconds without cracking sounds, and isn't constant (cracking sounds play on different parts of the same song, doesnt matter if its a low bass sound, could happen before, after or in the middle of the sound, and doesn't happen in the same place the next time i play the song or in other parts of the song where the low bass repeats over and over).

using Huawei FreeBuds 5i with LDAC codec

 

Thanks for your help guys, hope this problem could be solved.

Edited April 9 by PedroCO

[alexruedi]

Go to (Poweramp) settings > Audio > Output (2nd last Option), Click the one that says 'Active'. Choose where you have the problem (bluetooth?) and click the gear icon. There you find the setting for buffer size. Choose option big or huge

If this happens in all apps, try android settings > developer settings. There are a few bluetooth audio settings. Just lower volume before tinkering.

Edited April 9 by alexruedi

[PedroCO]

2 hours ago, alexruedi said:

Go to (Poweramp) settings > Audio > Output (2nd last Option), Click the one that says 'Active'. Choose where you have the problem (bluetooth?) and click the gear icon. There you find the setting for buffer size. Choose option big or huge

If this happens in all apps, try android settings > developer settings. There are a few bluetooth audio settings. Just lower volume before tinkering.

@alexruedi The problem is that i'm using the Equializer app, not the standalone player

Developer options come back to defaults once i leave the settings app...

Edited April 9 by PedroCO

[alexruedi]

Sorry I missed that. Did you try (Poweramp EQ) Settings > Equalizer > Block size/Block size for Hi-Res?

 

What else?

Don't bother. 'Fixing' bad audio quality is getting more & more involved. By now it would include: root, update 30+ system files, replace recovery so you can recover without full wipe, guess magic numbers and flags, 'fix' and recompile kernel without dsp, uncomment calibration files, run audioserver with some kind of 'timing' attack and the list goes on...

At that point, either use external DAC (e.g. FiiO) + UAPP if you care about quality (but that's with cable). Or learn ubuntu/arch and run bluetooth audio from there. Then Viper4Linux will do what you're looking for.

[PedroCO]

18 hours ago, alexruedi said:

Sorry I missed that. Did you try (Poweramp EQ) Settings > Equalizer > Block size/Block size for Hi-Res?

What else?

Don't bother. 'Fixing' bad audio quality is getting more & more involved. By now it would include: root, update 30+ system files, replace recovery so you can recover without full wipe, guess magic numbers and flags, 'fix' and recompile kernel without dsp, uncomment calibration files, run audioserver with some kind of 'timing' attack and the list goes on...

At that point, either use external DAC (e.g. FiiO) + UAPP if you care about quality (but that's with cable). Or learn ubuntu/arch and run bluetooth audio from there. Then Viper4Linux will do what you're looking for.

Yeah i did try block size in the EQ, didn't work either

I did some more testing...

• Using Neutron Player i had no problem with the EQ and cracking noises on my music
• Using other EQ apps (like Flat Equalizer or Wavelet) the cracking noise is minimal, almost gone, but still existant)
• Using Poweramp standalone player, my god, cracking noise is even worst even changing buffer options

I also tried different headphones and earphones...

• Soundpeats HS Mini Pro - Cracking noise on LDAC, no noises with LDAC off
• Huawei Freebuds 5i - Cracking Noise on LDAC
• Wired Soundmagic 80C - No cracking noise
• Wired DT 990 PRO - No cracking noise

 

From what i've been testing there seems to be a problem either with the LDAC codec, or with the way all apps, except Neutron, handle their equalizer. There has clearly been an improvement with other Play Store EQ apps, but still haven't solved my problem and they're nowhere as good as Poweramp EQ.
On the other side Neutron is great but i really wanted to start using TIDAL so that i don't depend on having my high-res local library updated at all time.

[GideonDude]

Hey there, made an account to reply to your thread because there are some glaring common denominators between us. We both own a Poco/Xiaomi phone and the issues with Ldac started after the HyperOs update. First I thought it could be due to my Soundcore Liberty 4 NC, but now it seems to be obvious it's a bug of some sort in HyperOS, the implementation of Ldac that is. It doesn't seem to be it can be fixed by the alteration of a setting. I have posted on Reddit about this and contacted both Xiaomi and Soundcore. 

I see you've tested other buds as well. Is it possible for you to try an Aptx codec by any chance? At the moment it really seems it's an Ldac issue. This sucks.

[PedroCO]

@GideonDude

Hey man, sorry for the delay

I've been trying to make this shit work for the last weeks lol, equalizers from play store kinda helped but as you say, there is definitely something going apeshit at OS-level since this happens only with LDAC.

Coincidentally I bought the same Anker earphones as you but didn't like em (do you hear some weird nose at the deep bass with LDAC on like an alarm? Maybe mine were defective...), but the time I had tested them I found no problem with the connection (albeit, I was alone at home)...

 

Some things I've discovered over the last weeks:
-Poweramp EQ suddenly stops working when the shuttering is more present

- Sometimes the EQ won't process audio, authough the active player is being detected and shows in "audio info", in this case a restart is needed

- The problem seems to happen way less frequently when using Poweramp player and neutron, worsens when using a music streaming app, and god forbids I open YouTube while keeping apple music on the background because, my god, I hear 1 word out of 10.

 

There must be some kind of CPU power management fuckup by Xiaomi, or they way the signal is being send via bluetooth to the earphones because that's what i guess could be the problem, but there's definitely something happening with the OS, and I wonder why since they advertise my phone as being HI-RES Wireless capable and with support for multiple high bandwidth codecs, also messing with Dev options didn't help.

I was thinking on buying the new Nothing Ears with LDHC codec, maybe that could help? Also I'll try and test some aptx earphones, just have to found them later in my house...