I have had a home studio now for about 6 years. Recently, I completely rebuilt it with all new gear. One of the issues that I’ve had with both systems was this high-pitched whining on the USB connection between the PC and the audio console. I hear it anytime I record into the PC using that USB connection. I’ve searched the internet looking for a solution, and recently found what has helped some, but unfortunately, didn’t help me at all. The solution was a an inline USB filter device that you connect between your PC’s USB and the audio console’s connection. I plugged it in, but unfortunately, there’s no change.
I was wondering whether anyone else has run across this annoying issue, and if so, what you’ve tried to get rid of it.
This is a very strange one. I haven’t experienced this with audio gear but did once get a high pitched noise plugging a 3D printer in via USB. It was because the USB was trying to provide power but couldn’t provide enough power to the unit (that was already powered by mains) so it would create this whining sound you mention.
Interesting, idea, I’m a little fearful of trying something like that until I exhaust all other options.
All of my equipment is plugged into Furman Power Conditioners, so one of the suggestions I was given by Arrakis, the maker of my audio console, was to make sure that everything was plugged into the same power plug on the wall. Since I have two Furman devices, I plugged both of those into the same outlet. Then followed their recommended order to plug each device into the back of the Furman devices in the correct order. When I powered everything back up, I noticed that it was silent and it seemed to me that the audio channel on my console for the USB computer port was silent! I thought it was resolved. Then I proceeded to put my radio station back on air. The first step is to launch “Rocket Broadcaster Pro”, to being streaming, and sound was back. Very disappointing.
My station itself is clean sounding because it all audio devices are from the Behringer UMC 1820. But I use the USB audio device for VoiceTracking, recording into Adobe Audition and anytime I ingest audio into my automation system recorded from the USB device into my automation system, its there.
Since I’m using all of the outputs on the UMC1820, I’m seriously considering buying the Behringer ADA8200 which can extend the UMC1820 by another 8 channels and using those connections instead of USB if I can’t get this sorted soon. I’d rather not spend the money, but I’m getting desperate to get this cleaned up.
My studio setup is quite complex given it all runs on one PC. (Automation, StereoTool audio processing, Streaming, etc). I see that you offer audio consultations where you offer consultations to help make sense out of studio issues. Is this something that you could help with? I want to buy a second PC so that I can run radio automation software on one PC and stream it to a new PC so that I don’t need to route out of the PC, into my audio console, out of my audio console, then back into the PC for the final processing and streaming to the Internet.
If so, it might make sense to book some time with you to lay out what I’m doing, and maybe there’s a better way to accomplish all this. I’m a radio veteran, but not so much with all this PC-related stuff.
I have the same usb audio whine between my computer, and the Rodecaster Pro. I hear is constantly through my Yamaha monitors and it drives me nuts.
To be fair to the RCP, I have an eGPU powering 2 49" monitors, and Thunderbolt 3 Raid Array connected to the left and right thunderbolt busses.
I also use the USB connections on the monitors to power my Logitech dongle and other USB-A peripherals.
Similar to @RetroRob, I think this is a complicated setup. And the noise could be coming from any of those described connections.
I’ve decided that I’ll use the MacBook Pro’s headphone jack and keep the RCP powered off unless I really need it., at which point I use the RCP headphone jack and the problem goes away too.
The noise issue is only with monitors. I have plans this next upcoming weekend to progressively disconnect and isolate all this to see what is causing the issue.
@goswh, so you only hear this in your monitors? Im my case, if I record a voiceover into Adobe Audition, and listen back using Mike’s “Male Voice” preset which really processes the audio, it’s very prominently recorded. I’ve since figured out that if I turn off the USB channel and then the whine is gone. But I use the USB port too frequently for playback from the PC, so I need to find a cure.
Good luck this weekend with your plans!
