Drop out when playing itunes on computer

[beaker_07]

I have my dell computer connected to my denon av amp with an Amazon basics HDMI cable.

When I am playing music from itunes and using the computer for other things internet browsing for example I am getting random dropout in the music.

Is there anything I can do to prevent this - would a better hdmi cable help - I know from other forums that a hdmi cable either works or it doesn't and audio quality they are all basically the same - but would i get any other improvements?

 

[jmjones]

I'm beginning to feel like a stalker! But I don't think many people use this section of the forum.

I'd suggest the cable is unlikely to be the bottleneck. You may want to check what your computer is doing first. Resource Monitor & Task Manager is a good start. Sorry if I'm telling you how to "suck eggs", but you may want to take a look at this:

https://www.howtogeek.com/school/using-windows-admin-tools-like-a-pro/lesson6/all/

Does the PC sound cut out when you aren't using the hdmi link?

 

[beaker_07]

No problem I appreciate the help - didn't know where else to post on the forum so as not to be off topic!

I'll check out your link - regarding the hdmi cable that is the only connecion I have between the PC and my amp.

Do you think ferrite rings ( I found these suggested on google) would help as i have a lot of other cables about?

 

[jmjones]

Hi Beaker,

What I'm suggesting is to check what the PC is doing first. The physical connectors should only be a problem if they can't transmit information fast enough. It's much more likely that for some reason the PC can't keep up with the "multitasking" you are asking it to perform.

The reason for asking about HDMI - if you don't use that link to your amp, does the PC sound still cut out? (Needs headphones to determine that I suppose). It's a process of elimination.

Check out the memory, CPU processor, etc. in task manager and see if you are running out of resources on the PC.

 

[beaker_07]

I have tried playing itunes through the front headphone socket to my amp and I still get dropout.

I have tried played music from the hard drive via VLC player same thing happens!

I have tried played music from the computers cd drive via VLC player same thing happens!

I haven't been able to anaylise the hard disc yet I will get a friend to look at that - I know that sometimes the hard drive appears to be working overtime while not appearing to be doing very much?

 

[MajorFubar]

More than likely just your PC's hard drive struggling to both read the music which iTunes is trying to play + do everything else you're wanting to do at the same time. Unless you have plenty of RAM and you use an app that buffers the music to RAM (iTunes natively does not), playing music from a computer uses your hard drive more or less continuously.

 

[beaker_07]

I had hoped to be able to use itunes and my lossless files instead of my cd's for most of my listening.

It is so easy to find the album or song on a computer - do you have any suggestions of what I could do or use to improve the current situation given I don't want to have to buy or upgrade my computer as it is relatively new.

I know very little about streaming is there anyway I could store my music files on an external hard disc and use something like a chromecast audio to "link" my music to my AVR???

 

[jmjones]

Hi Beaker,

A standard computer should be able to easily output music via hdmi without dropouts. Get your friend to check the resource meters for cpu, memory and hard drive and see if there is some kind of bottleneck. It may be as simple as closing down some background programmes.

You can stream from a NAS or play direct from a USB stick if you wish, but I would still suggest a check on your computer resources is first stop.

 

[beaker_07]

I looked up task manager and saw the following info:-

CPU 5%, Memory 38% Disk 4% when the computer is "idle" and CPU 9%, Memory 38% Disk 4%when itunes is playying does this tell you anything about my machine? I will quiz my friend when i next see him.

I was getting drop out this morning and I only had itunes running and my web browser open.

 

[MajorFubar]

I had hoped to be able to use itunes and my lossless files instead of my cd's for most of my listening.

It is so easy to find the album or song on a computer - do you have any suggestions of what I could do or use to improve the current situation given I don't want to have to buy or upgrade my computer as it is relatively new.

I know very little about streaming is there anyway I could store my music files on an external hard disc and use something like a chromecast audio to "link" my music to my AVR???

You can definitely store your files on an external drive and use iTunes to play them, it's how I've been doing it for over four years. What spec is your computer in terns of RAM and processor? Back in the day when I had Windows XP on a laptop with a 120GB HDD and 1GB of RAM it used to feel powerful and fast enough to rule the world. Multitasking was a breeze and very litle except video editing slowed it down. These days computers are ridiculously resource hungry. Power LED probably takes 4GB RAM just to light up.

 

[beaker_07]

The processor is an Intel Core i7-6700 CPU @ 3.40Hz and there is 16GB RAM

I thought it was a fairly good spec for the money and i certainly didn't see foresee problems with playing my music.

Would it be better to move my music files to an external hard disc and if I did would itunes see the new location of the files?

As I said before I know nothing about streaming and didn't think I would have to be looking at it as a possible solution - again I assume the music files would need moved to an external hard drive? Would I be able to use a chromecast audio with itunes - sorry but I don't know how it works really either?

Thanks again to everyone for their time and advice

 

[MajorFubar]

To be honest it's at least equal to the spec of the Mac I mix multitrack recordings on with sometimes 40+ tracks, which is far more hardware and processor intensive than playing iTunes, so maybe I'm barking up the wrong tree thinking it's some kind of buffering problem caused by doing too much at once. But I'd say the hdmi is a red herring seeing you've already told us the computer still does the same thing on headphones. Keeping the files themselves on an external device, be it a NAS or just a plug-in hard drive, will only fix the problem if, depite your computer's specs, it's still a data delivery issue.

 

[beaker_07]

Someone suggested it may be a poor quality hdmi socket in the graphics card - don't fancy buying a new one of those just yet as the machine is less than 6 months old.

I don't remember having this problem with a lower spec computer connected to a old marantz avr with a 3.5mm headphone to 2 phono connection?

 

[jmjones]

Hi Beaker,

The cpu, memory and hd %s would suggest everything is well within the machine capability. Nothing any where near "maxing out". I'd expect something to be peaking at 90%+ before it cut out due to not having enough buffering capacity.

I can't see it being a poor socket. If that was the case, why would it be intermittent? If you have any other hdmi sockets (including one on the motherboard), you could try it to see if it eliminates the issue.

Which virus checker are you using? Are there any background programs you are using that you could try shutting down to see if the are interfering in some way?

Sorry we aren't being more help. The problem seems a bit elusive.

 

[beaker_07]

I'm using BT's McAfee virus checker using approx. 2% memory and the only large background app is Microsoft Edge which is currently 22%.

At present I have 6 windows open - 1 is my email homepage, 1 is twitter, 1 is this file, 1 is ebay and 2 other websites. I don't know if that helps any.

Again thanks for everyones time and help - its certainly got me beat!

 

[beaker_07]

There is a hdmi socket on the motherboard but when I connect to it I lose the picture on the tv - I'm not sure what its for?

 

[jmjones]

Asking about the background programs - I was thinking there may be some specific program that is interfering. Can't see any likely candidates from your list. Might be worth examining if you get any drop-outs without anything running except iTunes.

The hdmi socket is used if your motherboard has on-board graphics. Do you get sound? If not, forget that one - it was just to check another physical connection.

I'm afraid you need a better PC geek than me. Can you phone a friend? *wacko*

 

[beaker_07]

Does anyone know if a Chromecast audio would work with my system to read the music off the hard disc without having to use a computer program - the dropout keeps happenening no matter what I do - I posted the problem on the dell community website - plenty of reads but unfortunately no replies!

Thanks to everyone for their help.

 

[beaker_07]

I joined Dell's forum and I am currently waiting for more info from one of their advisors - their initial response was for me to check with a different HDMI cable and also to try without my anti virus running I tried connecting the computer directly to the TV with a HDMI cable and the sound seems ok with no drop out from the TV speakers??!! Seems to be an incompatibility between the video card and the Denon - I'll monitor things and maybe contact Denon?