Good point, sorry about that. I'll try to summarize:
- ADWCleaner (did that, didn't help)
- not enough power from PSU (I don't know about that but the PSU was suggested to me on a forum when I bought my processor and it's still fairly new, a few months)
- see if problem persists in Safe Mode (on that note, I haven't tried that yet. Can I break anything when I do that?)

- special sound effects disabled in sound device properties (check)
- Windows Event Viewer (not sure what I'm looking at, there's quite a bit of red and yellow there but I don't know what's relevant)
- check device manager for missing or malfunctioning drivers (check)
- alternative sound device like PCI, USB or HDMI (none available to me atm)
- BIOS settings (not sure I should be doing that without knowing what I'm doing)

I don't think so, although I've been spending so much time in the device manager lately I'm considering putting up some pictures there.
Though not sure what that would do? I mean... if I disable it, sure, it won't crackle any more, but I won't hear anything else either?

Yes. And other tabs like "System" etc.

Please do that. Don't know if rebooting is necessary, but why not.

If you don't know it, you probably don't use it (Raid=combining two or more physical disc to a logical one, resulting in data redundancy and/or better performance).
I think you can safely deactivate the serial (COM) and parallel (LPT) ports unless you use some legacy devices, also usb support when no usb-device is in use.
It should be obvious to which SATA-ports your drives are connected and which you aren't using and thus can be switched off.
Other than that, check the mode of the sata-ports: is it IDE/AHCI/RAID (Do not change this before posting!)?

Don't be afraid. I'm not telling you to alter mem or cpu clocks or something. There's always the possibility to go back to system default.

<snip>

<Bigger Snip>

Hiya,

I recency had to deal with a smiler issue. IT was my power plan AND a underpowered hub that needed power. Before you keep going can I suggest a few things? first and foremost. STOP HERE and Breathe.
You've accounted for a large array of changes to you system; so many I doubt you will ever have a stable system again no matter what you did unless you undo all that stuff.

I suggest that since its not working to your satisfaction, that you restore your system via system restore to before you started to tinker. check the system if needed you may still to manually adjust things. Set msconfig to normal run mode. If you used other tools to disable startups, like autoruns, etc put all those items back. If you used Highjack this, restore you backups via hjt gui or system restore. Reinstall the latest stock drivers and enable everything you disable in device manager. reset filters to where they belong.

Reboot.

Check memory and cpu use. If needed using one tool - msconfig or autoruns alter things to your liking if needed.
Now apply all ms updates. every one of them. check though the suggested updates as well and apply all of them. The only things not to apply would be: video drivers, bing tools bars (update these if you use them). Reboot test. make a new restore point call it "Gold - updated". this is your best restore point to use if needed of if you forget what you have done after this point.

Download "tdsskiller" from http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/download/tdsskiller/ . Run it as admin. Fix anythign it finds and reboto if fixed anything. Install and update "Malwarebytes free edition" http://www.malwarebytes.org/ . update it . do a "quick scan" not a full scan. If it finds anything, let it clean things and then reboot when asked.

If you found anything above, test the problem if its fixed, then you an stop -- you're done.

Remember: disabling, removing things etc all failed to help so don't do them again. in the end you only to change one or two things long run and revert any other changes. If you cant express in one or two sentences what you did that helped that you did too many things and may have made your system less stable. if you think you fixed it then system restore and redo one set of changes . If that suddenly fails then restore and try another set.

Okay reviewing the list of changes here are a few suggestions:

1) check your drivers against the vendor pages - update any drivers that are outdated for windows 7. DO NOT use or take the advice of driver update utilities, registry cleaners, "help me find my driver" websites or such software. Vendor pages include: hp/dell, etc, nvidia/amd/creative. if you cant find a driver update dont panic, fiddling with drivers is not always helpful.

2) Check your usb hubs are fully powered. plug any hub that is missing power but has a power adapter in. Check that no hub is plugged into another hub more then one deep. If needed buy a hub with more ports or disconnect unneeded items. Test things out. Leave the unneeded hubs disconnected if that fails and move to step 2.
3) Open power plan and set your power plan to "High Performance". Open power properties and advanced.Disable all cpu scaling so minimum and max cpu read "100%". Disable USB selective suspend . Disable pci express scaling. for pictures, see http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/778-power-plan-settings-change.html

if the above fails to isolate the problem or fix undo all that! put the hubs back and system restore to "gold". then get local help or employ a remote control expert at this point based off what I've read you will have exceed the "Reasonable" level of changes you should do without professional help. If you do get help point them at this forums so they know what you did up to this point that will really help them.

Administrative Ereignisse (Administrative Events?) has a lot of red. Mostly Service Control Manager, some Winlogon, Security-SPP, few DistributedCOM.
Anwendung (Application?) has some red, Security-SPP, WMI, Winlogon.
Installation - nothing, it seems.
System - few red Service Control Manager.
Nothing in ACEEventLog, Hardware-Ereignisse, Internet Explorer, Key Management Service or Windows PowerShell.

I haven't done anything that requires "crawling under the desk and unplugging shit and rebooting" yet... I'm tired. :< I really appreciate your help though and I will do these things when my brain feels less like mashed potatoes.

That's like telling a bunny to not be fluffy.


Aw... crap. Now I'm confused as to what to do next.
I DID make a lot of changes (at least it feels like I did) and when I do anything there's always a chance that I screw something up.
But.

First: No USB hubs, though I tried different USB ports for my mouse and a PS/2 mouse at one point.
Also, I did change my power plan, specifically the things you mentioned (CPU, USB, PCI - seems your problem was really similar to mine as I got these suggestions from searching for solutions).

WinU isn't allowed to update my drivers, I do that manually with drivers from vendors' sites. (AMD, Realtek/ASUS)

I regularly run Malwarebytes scans, full and quick. As for TDSSKiller - I'll check that out, although the description confuses me a little, what with renaming and commands. Could I just... I dunno, download and run the thing?

Start-up programs: I only disabled ones where I knew what they are, mainly things I had installed myself. The advantage to my limited knowledge of computers is that I tend to not touch things that I don't quite understand. Same goes for disabling things in the device manager - if I don't know what it is, I leave it alone. (So what I disabled were greyed out duplicates of my mouse and tablet, a printer that isn't connected any longer, those kinds of things. Nothing that made me go "What the hell is that?")

Memory and CPU: Assuming All CPU Meter is just about accurate, so long as I'm not playing games my CPU usage idles around 2-5% with my browser open but not used. Most CPU usage when I actually do stuff comes from flashplayer (when watching youtube videos) and SeaMonkey (my browser) itself. Highest memory usage by smss.exe, svchost.exe and seamonkey.exe.

...alright, what I'm getting at is, I don't know about that system restore thing. I'm not sure which point to restore. I don't know if some of the things I did were actually good. So far it seems none of them were particularly bad, at least.
Not sure how obvious it is but I can't think all that well right now so I don't think I'll be doing anything today. My inability to process thoughts aside though, thanks for your elaborate reply.

Well, here's a half-assed update.
Ripped out shiny USB mouse, plugged in squeaky clanky PS/2 mouse, disabled all things USB in device manager.
Still crackling... oddly, in case it's relevant, it's now the PS/2 port driver that's causing latency issues (according to the monitor thing - i8042.sys is for that port, I think).
Still a little worried about my head exploding.
I was wondering, if this were a power supply issue, would other devices have problems too? Any cables or plugs inside the case that need checking? I did clean the headphone plug with an eraser, not sure if sufficient though.
Ooh, a Thief bundle.

I don't think it's a PSU issue, if it was your system would be far more glitchy and probably pop out at the first opportunity.
On the other hand your soundchip may be damaged by hotplugging or maybe it's just a faulty chip.
Still I wouldn't rule out a messed driver install too, maybe you can revert back to a previous systemrecovery point with drivers that still worked.

I think that using a previous restore point may help you. Every time you install windows updates a new restore point is created, so you already have some restore points even if you never made one manually .

Try to start in safe mode. I think there should be an option to restore your system. (After you select the safe mode option and before you logon to the system).
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/start-computer-safe-mode#start-computer-safe-mode=windows-7

If the problem is only related to games, you should consider updating the drivers (if any update is available). On board cards have issues with games some times. Does the problem exist when you listen to music?

I don't believe that the PSU is the source of the problem.

Edit: Some syntax changes.

If you can't identify the issue and hesitate to read error logs, alter risky settings/registry/bios etc., I would suggest that you do the following:

- flash your BIOS to the latest version. May sound risky to you, but it should be pretty safe and easy nowadays. I've seen there were many updates for your mobo which state "better system stability".
Download the latest BIOS and a BIOS-flash-tool (for windows) from the asus site. Read and follow the instructions of the bios-tool and don't be scared by possible warning notes.
- Reboot, and check if the problem is solved, if not:

- download the latest drivers from the asus site and the amd catalyst-suite, windows7-sp1-update (if necessary), preferably a windows-update-package (http://winfuture.de/downloadvorschalt,2671.html) and your most important software
- backup your important data
- (if you are brave, check the mode of your sata ports in the bios (rtfm) and switch it to ahci if its not the case already)
- do a full system reinstallation
- now that you have a fresh windows, disable windows update (or rather don't enable internet access) and install in this order:
- SATA/AHCI -driver from the asus site (would prefer the amd one, but afaik its currently not included in the latest package because of reported problems)
- AMD-catalyst-suite (it includes chipset- (ahci(?),usb3), gpu-, hdmi-audio-drivers)
- Realtek onboard audio, LAN drivers from the asus site
- install windows updates via the update-package
- check if the problem is solved, if not:
- possible causes; not sane bios-defaults, weird not so easy to solve irq-problems, driver issue, faulty hardware ...

Thanks once again for the replies.
I did a system restore now, going with the one from the latest Windows update which was apparently three days ago.
Now Thunderbird is freaking out for some reason but that's really not my priority.

That's good news, at least.

Nah, that would be too easy. Seems I never have simple problems with my PC. Not just games, it happily crackles whenever it feels like it.

Here's the thing with safe mode: I just tried that and... uh. I hit F8 and it asked me which drive to boot from (DVD or hard drive) so I selected and then... nothing. It just started up normally. Does Win7 still do that thing where it says "Safe Mode" in the corners of the screen? Because if that's what's supposed to happen, it went wrong.
(On the bright side, when prompted to select a drive it identified my hard drive as SATA? Questionable progress!)

I also did run TDSSKiller as suggested but it didn't find anything and just now another MBAM quick scan.

Noooo not the BIOS!
I actually sort of know how to do that, that is, I did that when I got my "new" processor, oh, half a year ago? It was not pleasant. I was in hyper-worry-mode. I got version 1502 right now so that's the second-latest?
Bit of a hassle, that one, as I'd have to hunt down a USB stick again.
Backup, too, is sort of an issue. Not impossible, mind you, it'd just take a while.

Gah, I'm going bonkers here. Just now I thought the crackling was gone which would mean something in the Windows Update were to blame but never mind. Still there.

The latest came almost a year later than 1502 and it fixes stability issues. You should give it a try.

I second this.

I didn't know that there was a BIOS update.
If your system was running smoothly, there was no reason to change anything, but since you have problems this update could be helpfull.

As for the safe mode I think that it doesn't show any message, but you recognise it since the resolution is low and there is no transparency to bars and windows. I remember that there was a prompt to logon the system as administrator or with your user account, which could have administation rights already and had an extra option for system restore instead of logon. I used system restore on my windows 7 installation about a month ago, after a windows update issue.

Sounds like and Ground Problem. maybe your Motherboard or something has Contact with your Chassis, or you had a Cold soldered point. Try to seek where , it´s really nasty. !

you can also try to shake your chassis slighty not rough, and see if there also came sounds out, if not, then you must see inside.


Best regards.

Ah well. I just made a bunch of incomprehensible noises, in case anyone was wondering.
Is that what a less stable BIOS version can do, randomly introduce odd issues? I should transform into a computer person.

Looks like I'll be doing another BIOS update soon then. :<

Hm. Did not happen. Odd.


Wouldn't that make it crackle constantly though?

Yes and No, It depends on how / Where / What makes the Contact.
mostly its an loud buzzing but thats not ever the case.
i think maybe the Connections unit is poorly shielded.

Well, since it's gonna be a few days before I can do a BIOS update, it doesn't hurt to check. Although if it's not something painfully obvious I'll probably not see a problem anyway. Hardware, tch. I can switch out parts alright but when it comes to troubleshooting you might as well ask a monkey (with due apologies to technically apt monkeys).