Audio stutters or sounds timestretched when CPU activity increases

[tristan888]

Hi all,

For the last few weeks, whilst playing music/videos on my Sony Vaio laptop, the sound flickers and stutters when the CPU activity increases or when there is hard drive activity (for example, when I load another program). This is obviously causing some form of interference with the sound. It never used to do this before; audio playback used to continute to sound smooth and uninterrupted whilst I was using the laptop for other things. Disabling services and statup processes reduced the problem, but that was only because there was less for the system to execute, therefore less processing activity, but this isnt really a solution. It is as if there must be nothing running at all in order to achieve continuing seamless playback.
The sound card uses RealTek audio drivers, which I have obtained from the Sony Vaio website. I have tried reinstalling them but this made no difference.
(OS: WinXP Service Pack 1 - might I need service pack 2?)

Cheers,
Tristan

 

[mega10169]

This usually means the CPU is too bogged down to render audio and load some other program at the same time. The remedy is to either get used to it or buy a new laptop.

Oh and what player are you using to play the music?

 

[tristan888]

I am using Windows Media Player. Would formatting the hard drive be worth a shot?

 

[Motoxrdude]

YEa, i would say go for it, if you have all of your stuff that you need is backed up.