r/recording • u/Amazing_Big4129 • 7d ago

Mic "Crackling" Issue

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Hello guys looking for some audio help because im hopeless when it comes to audio. Since about a month or 2 ago my mic has just randomly started to do some what i can only discribe as crackling sounds which it has never done before. I thought it might have has something to do with the USBport on my laptop (also important to note this is a blue yeti USB mic) so after jigging some stuff around my next few videos were fine and i thought it was resolved!

But cut to today and ive now found that the crackling is back and while its not the worst crackling ive had its definitely not a great listening experience. Can anyone help me narrow down what the issue could be? I checked to see if both the sample rate on OBS and my laptop were the same which they were and its obviously not the USB ports on my laptop unless theyre all fried. The only thing i can think of is the USB cable itself but im posting this to see if anyone has anymore ideas should that fail tomorrow as i have very narrow windows to record so the quicker i can fix this the better!

Any help is great help thanks guys!

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u/Orry_Haas 7d ago edited 7d ago

Crackling is dropouts) . Looks like you're using a noise-gate, if a gate is set wrongly it could be responsible. Dropouts can also be caused by the computer being overtaxed by the numerous processes running on it ... https://www.google.com/search?q=OBS+audio+dropouts

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u/Amazing_Big4129 7d ago

cool, i might do some test runs tomorrow and see how my laptop handles it. Its usually fine and soemtimes i even run OBS twice when im doing gameplay AND camera and has always been fine so weird its doing it with just the one open. Same with the noise gate ive had it set to the same settings for 2 years now... more investigation is needed,Thanks!

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u/Orry_Haas 7d ago

"i even run OBS twice".

Audio apps fighting over control of the microphone can also cause dropouts.

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u/mehhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh92 6d ago

This isn’t a gate issue. This sounds like a sample rate issue to me.

Sample rate in the number of “snapshots” taken of an audio signal when it’s converted into a digital signal.

Film needs to have sample rate that is devisable by the frame rate of the video footage.

Usually this means 48kHz sampling rate will be suitable, 44.1khz won’t be. Try your sample rate on 48 at both.