Sound bugs in TRL and Anniversary - pops and crackling noises

Oldpossum · 04-15-2012, 12:43 PM

In both Legend and Anniversary I have non-stop popping, crackling noises in the background. They're not unbearably loud, but they are quite annoying, especially after a few hours. At first, I thought it was supposed to be burning torches or something like that, but not in the middle of a Tokyo highrise.

I've updated my soundcard drivers (SB Audigy, duh!), and that didn't help a bit.

Is this a known issue? Is there a work-around?

I've been to the Eidos website, and it was completely unhelpful.

Help me out here, my fellow Steamies...

Oldpossum · 04-15-2012, 05:24 PM

Well, some searching has revealed that I am far from the only one who has these problems, though it seems to encompass a variety of operating systems, and the one common element is that all involve soundcards from Creative Labs. Then again, 90% of the computers in North America probably have Creative Labs soundcards in them. That's like saying they all involved MS operating systems. Well, duh, 98% or more of all PC's run MS OS's...

Here was the advice I found -

a) On a multi-core CPU, alt-tab out of the game, open the task manager and set CPU affinity of trl.exe from all cores to just one (right click on trl.exe, set affinity, uncheck all entries but CPU0), alt-tab back into the game. Sound should be fine now. This does work with the Steam release.

b) Start playing a youtube video for a few seconds, then pause. Start the game.

Both ways have worked for me on Win7 x64, Creative X-Fi, Steam release.

Unfortunately, unlike the person who posted the italicized quote above, neither of them worked for me on Win XP Pro with Audigy SE. (both of which are contemporaneous with the publication of the games in 2006/2007)

So yeah, help me out here, people...

Ankon · 05-07-2012, 06:41 PM

Hello,
I´ve just seen this post. I bought and played the game at retail launch, and at the time I had a SB Audigy and the same crackling sound problem.
One of the solutions to this, and the one that worked for me after searching many forums and help pages at the time, is running DxDiag and in the sound tab changing sound acceleration from 'full' to 'basic' or 'none', whichever works better for you.

Cheers.

Astral_Nomad · 05-10-2012, 09:12 AM

I cant speak for Legend as I dont have issues with that one (being a solo retail). But if i understand the Anniversary Edition, it has all the old games included does it not?

I can tell you from experience with TRAOD, the sound issues are NOT new, and updating drivers wont help. the only way i found to cure it was the turn off audio hardware acceleration. it sucks because you would have to turn it back on after you were done playing to resume normally.

04-15-2012, 12:43 PM	#1
Oldpossum Join Date: Feb 2010 Reputation: 0 Posts: 18	Sound bugs in TRL and Anniversary - pops and crackling noises In both Legend and Anniversary I have non-stop popping, crackling noises in the background. They're not unbearably loud, but they are quite annoying, especially after a few hours. At first, I thought it was supposed to be burning torches or something like that, but not in the middle of a Tokyo highrise. I've updated my soundcard drivers (SB Audigy, duh!), and that didn't help a bit. Is this a known issue? Is there a work-around? I've been to the Eidos website, and it was completely unhelpful. Help me out here, my fellow Steamies...

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04-15-2012, 05:24 PM	#2
Oldpossum Join Date: Feb 2010 Reputation: 0 Posts: 18	Well, some searching has revealed that I am far from the only one who has these problems, though it seems to encompass a variety of operating systems, and the one common element is that all involve soundcards from Creative Labs. Then again, 90% of the computers in North America probably have Creative Labs soundcards in them. That's like saying they all involved MS operating systems. Well, duh, 98% or more of all PC's run MS OS's... Here was the advice I found - a) On a multi-core CPU, alt-tab out of the game, open the task manager and set CPU affinity of trl.exe from all cores to just one (right click on trl.exe, set affinity, uncheck all entries but CPU0), alt-tab back into the game. Sound should be fine now. This does work with the Steam release. b) Start playing a youtube video for a few seconds, then pause. Start the game. Both ways have worked for me on Win7 x64, Creative X-Fi, Steam release. Unfortunately, unlike the person who posted the italicized quote above, neither of them worked for me on Win XP Pro with Audigy SE. (both of which are contemporaneous with the publication of the games in 2006/2007) So yeah, help me out here, people...

05-07-2012, 06:41 PM	#3
Ankon Join Date: Nov 2011 Reputation: 7 Posts: 28	Hello, I´ve just seen this post. I bought and played the game at retail launch, and at the time I had a SB Audigy and the same crackling sound problem. One of the solutions to this, and the one that worked for me after searching many forums and help pages at the time, is running DxDiag and in the sound tab changing sound acceleration from 'full' to 'basic' or 'none', whichever works better for you. Cheers.

05-10-2012, 09:12 AM	#4
Astral_Nomad Join Date: Aug 2010 Reputation: 13 Posts: 264	I cant speak for Legend as I dont have issues with that one (being a solo retail). But if i understand the Anniversary Edition, it has all the old games included does it not? I can tell you from experience with TRAOD, the sound issues are NOT new, and updating drivers wont help. the only way i found to cure it was the turn off audio hardware acceleration. it sucks because you would have to turn it back on after you were done playing to resume normally.