XMC Popping noise - not the issue already known??

[deewan]

I've read all about the known issues of the popping and cracking noises when switching channels, tracks or silence soundtracks with the XMC. Three times now I've experienced a very loud pop while using my XMC but it's been in the middle of a movie, not searching, track changing or sound format changing. It's also happened twice with my movie server and once with my Oppo 103.

The first time it ever happened I thought it was the soundtrack and that I blew driver. The pop seemed to come from the center channel. I backed the volume down, inspected the drivers and found no damage. I watched the same scene again at 3db lower volume and there was nothing. I've watched the scene several other times and no popping and I believe I've been back to the same volume level.

The next time it happened it also came from the center channel, different movie, but same loud pop and same source. The sound is best described as a louder version of a cap blowing.

Then last night, from my left channel I heard the same loud pop while watching a movie. Again, volume was turned up, but normal home theater levels. I was at -17db on the XMC. Not sure what the actual measured volume was in the room, but nothing stupid loud. The pops are so loud I pulled my speakers apart looking for a blown cap/resistor on the crossover or voicecoil. I haven't found any damage at all, thank goodness. Has anyone else experienced this? I've searched the forums and haven't heard of anything happening in the middle of a movie without changing tracks. I should also add these pops are not from a soft to a loud scene in the movie. It's in the middle of an action scene.

I'm not sure if it's the XMC, perhaps something caused by Dirac, maybe the amp or maybe some sort of short in the speakers. The noise has come form different channels which are different amps and I can't recreate. It's driving my crazy and makes me worry about damaging my speakers.

Any ideas?

[AudioHTIT]

I had a lot of popping, with my Hopper, AppleTV, and Mac, I first played with TOSLink and USB alternate audio routes. Finally did a power off, factory reset and reload, it seems to have helped, I haven't heard any of the pops I heard previously, but mine were not as loud as you describe. I also haven't been using Dirac. Might also want to try the new 4.0 firmware, though there's been no report that it helped anything like this.

[deewan]

Thanks for the info. I just loaded firmware 4.0 last night. I hope to start watching more movies and hope to find I never experience the popping again. If not, I'll have to try turning off Dirac and other items until I find the cause.

[405x5]

Oct 15, 2016 23:29:30 GMT -5 deewan said:

I've read all about the known issues of the popping and cracking noises when switching channels, tracks or silence soundtracks with the XMC. Three times now I've experienced a very loud pop while using my XMC but it's been in the middle of a movie, not searching, track changing or sound format changing. It's also happened twice with my movie server and once with my Oppo 103.

The first time it ever happened I thought it was the soundtrack and that I blew driver. The pop seemed to come from the center channel. I backed the volume down, inspected the drivers and found no damage. I watched the same scene again at 3db lower volume and there was nothing. I've watched the scene several other times and no popping and I believe I've been back to the same volume level.

The next time it happened it also came from the center channel, different movie, but same loud pop and same source. The sound is best described as a louder version of a cap blowing.

Then last night, from my left channel I heard the same loud pop while watching a movie. Again, volume was turned up, but normal home theater levels. I was at -17db on the XMC. Not sure what the actual measured volume was in the room, but nothing stupid loud. The pops are so loud I pulled my speakers apart looking for a blown cap/resistor on the crossover or voicecoil. I haven't found any damage at all, thank goodness. Has anyone else experienced this? I've searched the forums and haven't heard of anything happening in the middle of a movie without changing tracks. I should also add these pops are not from a soft to a loud scene in the movie. It's in the middle of an action scene.

I'm not sure if it's the XMC, perhaps something caused by Dirac, maybe the amp or maybe some sort of short in the speakers. The noise has come form different channels which are different amps and I can't recreate. It's driving my crazy and makes me worry about damaging my speakers.

Any ideas?

Your story is just like mine.
Since I got the XMC1 (October 2014) I've had the "beyond frightening " digital pop....as I describe it. Loud and terribly unnerving when it happens.
Now I will say it it's been about 6 months with no recurrence.
I'm up with 4.0......think I was on 3.1 last occurance.
I would guess 3 times in two years was how many times it happened altogether.

Bill

[geebo]

I wonder if this could be some kind of static discharge.

[405x5]

Just a follow up.....
Never had this happen during a DVD or bluray.

Bill

[405x5]

Oct 16, 2016 7:46:41 GMT -5 deewan said:

Thanks for the info. I just loaded firmware 4.0 last night. I hope to start watching more movies and hope to find I never experience the popping again. If not, I'll have to try turning off Dirac and other items until I find the cause.

I have yet to implement Dirac, so I would think Dirac has nothing to do with this.

I recalled while revisiting this issue, about when DTS was the "new" thing.
If I remember correctly, you needed to make sure you DID NOT select dts on a player that would be running with a receiver not equipped with dts decoding. The result could be damage to your loudspeakers 📢 hearing, or both.

Back to topic, I think the problem is a random chance occurrence, happening between encoded bitstream and the decoding process, where there is an error in the "stream" resulting in that notorious pop.
Very likely, the glitch is occurring between a specific disc/player combination leaving the processor to deal with a randomly flawed data stream.

Bill

[deewan]

All good info 405x5. I wish it wasn't happening to anyone, but I'm glad I'm not crazy and someone else can confirm it's an issue. If you have not implemented Dirac, I will scartch that idea right now. Like you and I have determined its a random thing. I cannot recreate it even rewatching the same scene moments after the pop happens.

geebo's idea about a static discharge makes as much sense as anything I've thought up in my mind. It's not amp related since it's happened on channels from different amps. It's not track/scene related since I can't recreate it by rewatching the same scene. It can't be room correction processing since it's happened to you and you haven't implmented Dirac. And it's happened to me within 5-10 of watching and 90+ minutes into a movie. Hmmmm. Hopefully with fw 4.0 and after I'll never expereince it again.

[405x5]

The only other thing I can offer up at the moment is that since I replaced the last bluray player in the system, the problem has gone away.
That was over 6 months ago.
The player was not swapped out for that reason, but needless to say I'm satisfied for now.
Static discharge is highly unlikely in my opinion

Bill

[deewan]

Oct 16, 2016 22:48:44 GMT -5 405x5 said:

The only other thing I can offer up at the moment is that since I replaced the last bluray player in the system, the problem has gone away.
That was over 6 months ago.
The player was not swapped out for that reason, but needless to say I'm satisfied for now.
Static discharge is highly unlikely in my opinion

Bill

Hmmm... I've experienced the issue while using both my Oppo 103D and my media streamer. Which leads me to believe if it is caused by the equipment I am unlucky enough to own two pieces that cause the issue. I'm hoping the latest firmware resolved the issue by accident since it may not be a known issue.

[solidstate]

I've heard this also a couple of times on my XMC-1/UPA-1 monoblock stack.

New firmware out!

I had better flash the XMC-1 and do a factory reset.

[405x5]

Oct 16, 2016 19:56:14 GMT -5 deewan said:

All good info 405x5. I wish it wasn't happening to anyone, but I'm glad I'm not crazy and someone else can confirm it's an issue. If you have not implemented Dirac, I will scartch that idea right now. Like you and I have determined its a random thing. I cannot recreate it even rewatching the same scene moments after the pop happens.

geebo's idea about a static discharge makes as much sense as anything I've thought up in my mind. It's not amp related since it's happened on channels from different amps. It's not track/scene related since I can't recreate it by rewatching the same scene. It can't be room correction processing since it's happened to you and you haven't implmented Dirac. And it's happened to me within 5-10 of watching and 90+ minutes into a movie. Hmmmm. Hopefully with fw 4.0 and after I'll never expereince it again.

Looking forward to an update about the pops after 4.0??

Bill

[deewan]

Well, here is an update after the 4.0 firmware load. I still get a loud popping noise. The interesting thing now is I can reproduce it using the same track at the same timestamp. Below is a video with the pop. At 6.5 seconds into the video you can see the pop and you can almost see the drivers flex as well.

Some interest things I was able to do tonight:

• Reproduce the popping sound at the exact same timestamp of the movie several times.
• The popping did not occur if I had the volume at < 20db
• I did not risk recreating the pop with the volume at above -20db.

I watched the scene several times. When I would watch the scene at -24db, no pop. At -23db, no pop. Nothing at -22db or -21db. As soon as I had the volume at -20db, the pop happened and I was able to create it three times in a row. Personally I've decided this is an issue and not a one time deal. Not sure what would cause the issue. So that everyone knows what gear I'm dealing with...

Emotiva XMC-1
Emotiva XLR interconnects
Emotiva RMC-2
10 gauge speaker cable to my DIY speakers.
I've watching the media using a MKV file saved on my NAS being streamed through my media player.

[hosko]

Are you sure its not the source video, there has been mkv tools that created popping noises with DTS-MA and have been updated.

[deewan]

Nov 21, 2016 1:13:52 GMT -5 hosko said:

Are you sure its not the source video, there has been mkv tools that created popping noises with DTS-MA and have been updated.

I'm fairly certain it is not the video source. After I posted last night I watched Star Wars Force Awakens. I got the same pop out of the same speaker when Starkiller base fired and destroyed the three planets. I was watching that movie using my Oppo 103D and the actual BluRay disc since I haven't ripped that disc yet. I didn't rewatch the scene to determine if I could reproduce the issue over and over but I may try it tonight. I just get scared since it only happens at volumes >-20db and who knows if it could cause damage to my speakers if I do it enough.

[KeithL]

Since it only seems to happen at high listening levels, have we ruled out the possibility of a plain old clip?

Nov 21, 2016 9:27:45 GMT -5 deewan said:

Nov 21, 2016 1:13:52 GMT -5 hosko said:

Are you sure its not the source video, there has been mkv tools that created popping noises with DTS-MA and have been updated.

I'm fairly certain it is not the video source. After I posted last night I watched Star Wars Force Awakens. I got the same pop out of the same speaker when Starkiller base fired and destroyed the three planets. I was watching that movie using my Oppo 103D and the actual BluRay disc since I haven't ripped that disc yet. I didn't rewatch the scene to determine if I could reproduce the issue over and over but I may try it tonight. I just get scared since it only happens at volumes >-20db and who knows if it could cause damage to my speakers if I do it enough.

[deewan]

Nov 21, 2016 15:51:23 GMT -5 KeithL said:

Since it only seems to happen at high listening levels, have we ruled out the possibility of a plain old clip?

Nov 21, 2016 9:27:45 GMT -5 deewan said:

I'm fairly certain it is not the video source. After I posted last night I watched Star Wars Force Awakens. I got the same pop out of the same speaker when Starkiller base fired and destroyed the three planets. I was watching that movie using my Oppo 103D and the actual BluRay disc since I haven't ripped that disc yet. I didn't rewatch the scene to determine if I could reproduce the issue over and over but I may try it tonight. I just get scared since it only happens at volumes >-20db and who knows if it could cause damage to my speakers if I do it enough.

I have not. I'll research more tonight but at -20db the volume is loud, but it isn't LOUD. While my speakers aren't terribly easy to drive (roughly 4-ohm), I would assume the XRP-2 would be able to handle them with ease since I had previously driven these speakers with a 100wpc Denon AVR and never heard clipping.

[hosko]

Does it happen on every audio channel? Perhaps one of the channels has been gained up too high in conjunction with any other processing thats going on.

[goozoo]

Nov 21, 2016 16:14:41 GMT -5 deewan said:

Nov 21, 2016 15:51:23 GMT -5 KeithL said:

Since it only seems to happen at high listening levels, have we ruled out the possibility of a plain old clip?

I have not. I'll research more tonight but at -20db the volume is loud, but it isn't LOUD. While my speakers aren't terribly easy to drive (roughly 4-ohm), I would assume the XRP-2 would be able to handle them with ease since I had previously driven these speakers with a 100wpc Denon AVR and never heard clipping.

What is happening is what Keith has described and that is clipping.  Your speakers are rated at 4 ohms and you're pushing 1000 WPC into each channel with the XPR-2.  Clipping is occurring not because you are running out of headroom on the amp (which is usually the case), but rather because your speakers are not rated to handle 1000 WPC.  They are being over-driven; and when combined with any room EQ, pushed past the point of what they can reproduce. If you insist on listening at this level with that much power, you can mitigate the clipping by determining the frequency(ies) causing the clipping and setting the PEQ or DIRAC to compensate.  You will need to use REW and the RTA (real time analysis) module to find out the correct frequencies.  Alternatively you can upgrade the speakers, albeit a more costly option.  

Hope this helps.

[deewan]

Nov 21, 2016 19:58:10 GMT -5 goozoo said:

What is happening is what Keith has described and that is clipping.  Your speakers are rated at 4 ohms and you're pushing 1000 WPC into each channel with the XPR-2.  Clipping is occurring not because you are running out of headroom on the amp (which is usually the case), but rather because your speakers are not rated to handle 1000 WPC.  They are being over-driven

Hope this helps.

Interesting, but I don't believe that is the case. I know several people with pro amps with as much power driving this same speaker and they have not experienced the popping noise. Again, I am listening to these speakers at with 100db peaks (short bursts). I use the same drivers across the front three speakers and the center channel driven by the XPA has also clipped, with I'm guessing around 300 watts. The other thing that is interesting, it's never been in the right speaker. It's been in the center and the left, but never the right.

I did some more research tonight. The same file has the same popping sound when using both my media player and my Oppo 103D. My brother has my disc of the movie so I asked him to bring the disc back during Thanksgiving to see if I can get the disc to make the same pop. That will eliminate the chance it is the MKV file. The Star Wars scene where I heard the pop last night, I wasn't able to get to pop tonight, but I didn't push it past -19db on the volume.