Static in sound playback

Here's the scenario.

When playing CDs back through my CD-Rom and when playing games I notice static in the sound.

If I play an mp3 back through Realplayer or Morpheus - no static.

If I play a CD through Realplayer or Mediaplayer - static

Connected speakers to the headphone jack on the CD-Rom. Crystal clear - no static.

If I take the CD in question and play it on my home audio player - no static.

We've elminated the speakers, and the cd-rom and the CD.

I un/reinstalled the drivers for the Ensoniq sound card. Still getting static.

The drivers are native to XP, Creative doesn't have a driver on their website so I can't try a different one.

I thought it might have been EMI from the rest of the cables on the back of the computer but since my mp3s play fine that seems to be ruled out.

Is it possible that the audio codecs have been corrupted?

Just looking for a little help!

Thanks,
Gary

Here's the system:

I WILL KD266 M/B With Athlon 1.0 266FSB
512 MB SDRAM PC133
40 GB 7200 Maxtor Drive
Ensoniq PCI soundcard
Geforce 2 MX200
Labtec Pulse 424 speakers
Delta 52X CD-ROM
Creative 8432 CDRW
XP Professional on clean install /NTFS

 

Figured it out.

Figured it out - most of it anyway.

I bought a cheap $9 four channel sound card to replace my Ensoniq. If I still got static I knew that the card wasn't to blame.

New card - still static.

I poked around a bit more and realized that I only got the static if I played a CD through the 52X Delta and not through the Creative 8432 burner.

Further investigation revealed a lot less static in my games with my crystal chipset card than my creative chipset card - enough of a reduction that I can call it satisfactory.

I tried different cables on the cd-rom, 80 conductor, 40 conductor nothing made a difference. I noticed that the Cd-roms would still play music even with the audio cable unplugged. Hmmmmm.

If that's the cause Windows is obviously extracting the music digitally through the IDE cable as opposed to analog through the sound cable.

Went into Device manger and disabled playing audio digitally for the Delta 52x cd-rom - static is gone!!!

Even though the Delta is a newer drive than my Creative burner it apparently doesn't like to play cd's through a digital connection.

So problem solved!

Just thought I'd let you know!!

Thanks,

Gary

 

What a trip, eh? Had the samo a few times myself, thought I'd gone nuts the first time after I removed the cd to sound card cable & the sound still came thru & was clear'r & louder! Fell to my knees with hands clasped just under my nose

 

Well, apparently the sound card I picked up isn't worth a ****.

This card does't produce static through my games like the ensoniq did, but playback is distorted.

It's the kind of distortion you get on a cheap radio when the music is just outside the frequency range of the speakers.

I have a set of Labtec Pulse 424s and a set of Creative SBS20s. With either set of speakers mid-range sounds are distorted at any volume level and regardless of how bass or treble is set.

Tried drivers from the crystal web site in lieu of the native xp drivers and no differences noted.

Not sure what's going on - bad sound card perhaps?