Intermittent high distortion and screeching during playback (ref#D4YHFQ)

[golfguy125]

Hi! What’s not quite right with Roon?

· None of the above quite fits

None of the above quite fits

· None of these quite match

Tell us what's going on

· High distortion and screeching during playback but doesn’t occur all the time. Roon is installed on a laptop with windows 11. The system chain is : laptop connected to network via WiFi, magna mano ultra 3 running Gentoo player connected to network via Ethernet then connected to Laiv harmony dac thru I2s. I use the laptop or iPad for Roon control. The problem
occurs on both. I had no problems for nearly a year and about a month ago this started occurring. No changes in the system have occurred. I have tried a few laptops and it occurs on both.

Tell us about your home network

· Starlink router

[benjamin]

Hi @golfguy125,

Thanks for writing in and I’m sorry to hear about your issues!

Let’s first test bypassing Roon entirely. Can you play music locally on the Gentoo player (if possible) using:

• MPD / HQPlayer / local playback method

• Use the same I²S output → Laiv Harmony DAC

Result interpretation

• Distortion still occurs → Not Roon, likely clocking, DAC, I²S, or streamer
• Clean playback → Points to Roon / RAAT / network path

This is one of the most important isolation steps. We’ll be monitoring for your reply and results, thank you! 🙌

[connor]

Hi @golfguy125,

In order to isolate the source of the audible artifacts we’ll need to know the results of the specific tests in the post above.

The most likely culprit here is an I2S clock sync issue based on the symptom, but we’re going to need to proceed deductively, removing one variable in the chain at a time.

Another more immediate test you can perform would be to test direct USB playback on the magna mano/Gentoo player itself (connected to the Windows server machine).

Can you please also share the name of a track that last exhibited these audible artifacts during playback? Are you playing local library content when this occurs?

We’ll watch for your reply. Thank you!

[connor]

Hi @golfguy125,

We’d really like to help isolate the source of this distortion during playback but we so far haven’t seen a reply to this thread. We’ll need the details requested in the previous post, including the results of the direct USB test, in order to proceed.

If you no longer require assistance, this thread will eventually auto-close. Thanks!