Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
New 16" Speakers Popping
- Thread starter jogales
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
For me, it was mostly fixed. Sometimes I hear a crackle when listening to music. Sometimes its more frequent, which seems to be related to Audio Hijack, which I'm sometimes using.
I have no specific way to replicate that. I just the feeling that routing audio with Audio Hijack causes some crackling through the speakers. I routed the sound of an external microphone to Blackhole with 2 and 16 channels, with an volume increaser before that.
The pop still exists... but far less often. I'm not it was fixed or if just periodically resetting my machine has helped.
I can report back that the crackling occurs extremely frequently and heavily during editing with Premiere Pro (version 24.0 on macOS Ventura 13.6.2, MBP 16" 2021). Its not as frequent when watching YouTube, which again confirms that high CPU/GPU usage triggers the crackling more often.
I read reports that Sonoma should fix that, but I'm holding off the update because of Creative Cloud incompatibilities and other issues that currently exist.
And again, well done, Apple. 2 years in and your premium product's speakers still sounds like trash.
I read reports that Sonoma should fix that, but I'm holding off the update because of Creative Cloud incompatibilities and other issues that currently exist.
And again, well done, Apple. 2 years in and your premium product's speakers still sounds like trash.
Last edited:
I'm getting this popping all the time on my 14" running macOS 14.1.1. Keep having to restart to get rid of it. Really incredibly annoying
I have not - is that known to resolve this issue? Sounds pretty daunting to me to lose all my settings or have to restore from my last Time Machine backup, but I'll do it if there's a reasonable chance of success to get rid of the popping.
So far I've only tried updating to the latest software, deleting the audio .plist files, and changing the MIDI format to 44,100 Hz
What helped me was, before deleting these audio .plist files, entering this in Terminal:
sudo kill -9 `ps ax|grep 'coreaudio[a-z]' | awk '{print $1}'`
This kills the audio process. Then delete the plist Files, empty trash & restart.
swingerofbirch
macrumors 68040
I only recently started having this happen on my MBP 14" M1 Pro, makes me wonder if it's hardware and not software since everyone else's seems to be getting better and mine only recently started. I'm on 14.1.2. It's probably not related but I just recently updated my iPhone to iOS 17 and I now see it a a microphone input source (I'm not using it for that though). The timing fits with when the popping/crackling started, but I doubt it's related. Just mentioning it in the off chance it is.
The pops and scratches are back for me. It feels like I got about a year with only rare instances, but now it's happening all the f*king time. I can't replicate it on demand, so I can't take it to the Apple Store. I just have to use the computer all day and then it'll happen several times through the day.
Someone on Threads suggested deleting plugins for Rogue Amoeba and even though I didn't have any of those apps for years, it turns out I had a folder called ACE Driver in /Library/Audio/Plugins which is a remnant of Airfoil and/or Audio Hijack Pro, neither of which I haven't had installed on my computer for nearly a decade, but somehow got passed on in computer upgrades. Deleting it unfortunately didn't fix the problem but now I'm wondering if there's more of this.
I asked other MBP users and it was fewer than half who've ever experienced this. Most didnt know what I was talking about at all. It might be our setup, rather than our hardware. I feel tempted to wipe my computer and do a clean install, with no file transfer.
Someone on Threads suggested deleting plugins for Rogue Amoeba and even though I didn't have any of those apps for years, it turns out I had a folder called ACE Driver in /Library/Audio/Plugins which is a remnant of Airfoil and/or Audio Hijack Pro, neither of which I haven't had installed on my computer for nearly a decade, but somehow got passed on in computer upgrades. Deleting it unfortunately didn't fix the problem but now I'm wondering if there's more of this.
I asked other MBP users and it was fewer than half who've ever experienced this. Most didnt know what I was talking about at all. It might be our setup, rather than our hardware. I feel tempted to wipe my computer and do a clean install, with no file transfer.
Is there any REAL fix on this issue? I recently listened to Apple Music and there were pops everytime I adjusted the volume, loaded a web page, or just breathed on it (okay, that last one isn't true.) Still, it's real annoying. Do the newer M2 Pro or M3 Pro MBP's have this issue? I'm still on Monterey, if that matters.
There must be multiple sources of this issue, and different variants of it. Apparently sometimes it's high memory usage, sometimes it's Intel audio processes (if somebody in one of the Apple Discussions was right).
In my case, I finally found the root cause: the PiPifier Safari extension. I have no idea how or why it would cause the popping, as it did it even when the extension wasn't actively in use and I was watching full-screen video. But I'm 99.9999999% that was it, as I had constant pops before and now that it's uninstalled I've had zero over the past five days.
I also deleted the .plist files and rebooted after uninstalling the extension, but removing the files alone and rebooting had only temporarily (for ~one hour) solved the issue previously. For reference, I'm using a 14" M1 Pro MBP. I wasn't getting the prolonged low-pitch grumbles that some people were getting, but rather intermittent high pitched pops. All gone now! So happy.
In my case, I finally found the root cause: the PiPifier Safari extension. I have no idea how or why it would cause the popping, as it did it even when the extension wasn't actively in use and I was watching full-screen video. But I'm 99.9999999% that was it, as I had constant pops before and now that it's uninstalled I've had zero over the past five days.
I also deleted the .plist files and rebooted after uninstalling the extension, but removing the files alone and rebooting had only temporarily (for ~one hour) solved the issue previously. For reference, I'm using a 14" M1 Pro MBP. I wasn't getting the prolonged low-pitch grumbles that some people were getting, but rather intermittent high pitched pops. All gone now! So happy.
Last edited:
I don't have PiPifier nor am I running any Intel processes, yet I have the issue. The reason so many of us think we've found the solution is because it's so difficult to reproduce and unpredictable as to the next time it'll happen, so the issue "goes away" but it just means it doesn't happen for a period after a "phantom solution".
I installed eqMac and the problem went away. It even enables me to reproduce the issue on demand by fiddling with the bass. This seems to happen when there's a sudden change in bass so it makes sense. eqMac may be softening those transitions or keeping the bass stable or below a certain threshold that it suppresses it.
"Fixed" for now, but the underlying issue is still there, just being masked by a third party app. I'm glad to hear from some people that Apple is at least aware of this, which means they'll figure it out a lot better than us throwing stuff at the wall. I spent $6000 on this machine and if/when Apple eventually fixes the issue, I'll still have spent the entire lifetime of having this Mac dealing with unusable audio. If there's ever a class action on this, I'm going to feel 100% justified in taking back any money I can.
Agreed that there should be a class action, it has gone on way too long. In my case it really does seem to have been the PiP extension, as it was near constant with it installed and has disappeared without it. I’m sure there are a number of other ways the root cause is being exacerbated for different people. I’ll report back if it returns for me.
Installing eqMac and intentionally invoking it is interesting. I may do that.
Are you only seeing it when your memory utilization is high? I’ve seen a bunch of people claim that, but that was never the case for me (none of my computing activities are all that strenuous).
Yes, it's far more frequent when I'm running a ton of tabs or working in an app that requires a lot of memory. But maybe it's when I notice it more in my use-case. I think I've learned to just not play audio on this machine, which is a terrible place to have landed on. I cringe at the thought of those pops and cracks coming up so I just play music on HomePods around my house. I still get it when I'm watching a YouTube video which I can't help but play with sound.
Alright. Completely eating my words here. Popping is back. Longest I'd gone in a long time without it, but it's back. Shoot.
Sorry to hear that. As I've mentioned, we feel we have the problem dealt with in an action we take, but it's an observer's bias, kind of like watching and waiting for water to boil. It doesn't boil when I'm looking at it and I've waited a long time! I've solved boiling! Leaves the kitchen, comes back, the water is boiling!
Try eqMac. I've thrown everything at this, I've played bass heavy songs, ran 100+ tabs and played Youtube, no pops or cracks. But then again, I'm probably just watching water boil.
This is what I experienced too. Popping happens when there's a memory pressure (indicated by a yellow graph).