Every 5 seconds I get a pop or noise spike.

[duder]

I am runing Ubuntu on an older Acer Aspire one netbook. When I use Audacity to record audio from a digital recorder or FM radio I get very loud pops exactly every 5 seconds. It pretty much makes the audio unuseable. I suspect that the netbook may not have enough processing power and may be glitching when too much is going on. Any ideas? Thanks duder

[steve]

When I use Audacity to record audio from a digital recorder or FM radio

You mean a "real" radio - not software - connected to your computer somehow?
How is the radio connected to the computer?

I suspect that the netbook may not have enough processing power and may be glitching when too much is going on.

That's possible,

[duder]

Yes its a real battery powered AM FM radio. I use a stereo cable with the small 3.5mm jacks to go into my mic input on my netbook. I usually record mono on Audacity. Also I use the same cable to mic jack setup for the digital recorder.

I had also though maybe I was over driving the input, but it seems like the actual recorded sound is OK.

[steve]

Is Ubuntu up to date?
Which version of Audacity? (look in "Help > About Audacity")

Go into "Edit menu > Preferences > Recording" and set "Audio to buffer" to 200. Does that make any difference (better or worse)?

What are the available options in Device Toolbar?

[duder]

The OS should be up to date, I just installed up dates this morning. The version of audacity version is 2.0.0
I found when i turn up the quality to 24 bit 32000 sample rate the noise goes away. However it slows way down. I made some 10 second test clips and once I click stop its take about 30 seconds for it to catchup.

[Dr. Killjoy]

I also get the same problem, I guess.

I'm running Audacity 2.0.3 on Linux Mint 15 64bit Cinnamon on a desktop computer. I can play long interviews without any trouble, but sometimes, when I start doing the montage when removing audio, I hear clicks/pops. And then, on playback, every 5 seconds or so.

Does this have to do with the block files that don't connect to each other very well?
And how come I don't get this error all the time?

I am already recording and playing on 32000 bits.

[steve]

What is the specification / model number of your Acer Aspire?
Ubuntu is about the "heaviest" of all Linux distributions, so may not be well suited to an older machine. I use Debian Squeeze on an Aspire 5735 with Gnome Classic desktop. On an even older machine (Pentium II 500 MHz) I use Debian with XFCE desktop.

[Dr. Killjoy]

If you're asking me, I'm not using a notebook or netbook. Working on a desktop computer.

AMD Dual core processor 4200+ 2,4 GB RAM

[steve]

If you're asking me

I was asking the OP (duder).

[Gale Andrews]

Ubuntu is about the "heaviest" of all Linux distributions, so may not be well suited to an older machine.

Ubuntu was still quite workable on lower powered machines until 10.x. I seriously question that current versions are usable at their stated minimum requirements of 1 GHz, 512 MB RAM (if you want to keep GNOME).


Gale