The issue cpthk and isamu had produced static and distorted audio, apparently using HLE audio. Audio also reportedly looped. I don't think either of them used builds after the New AX HLE merge or tried using LLE audio (at least not with fullspeed LLE audio).
Topken, haddockd, and myself have noticed that audio has static after extended playtimes, usually a couple of hours. This happens on builds before and after the New AX HLE merge, and it happens with HLE or LLE audio. Apparently affects multiple ucodes, since haddockd has noticed this issue on WW. Atm, haddockd is regression testing to find where this might have been introduced. I myself have only noticed this on Skies of Arcadia (I don't usually play Dolphin long enough, usually under an hour at a time). I'm going to look at other games eventually on older builds.
Games affected with the first issue:
NSMB Wii
DKCR
Games affected with the second issue:
Baten Kaitos
Wind Waker
Kirby Return to Dreamland
Resident Evil 4
Mario Kart Wii
Skies of Arcadia
I first noticed the issue with ToS(GC) and I have noticed it with Baldurs Gate Dark Alliance as well as with Wind Waker before and after the Ax-HLE merge as I tested with both 3.5-33 the build right before the the merge and with build 3.5-79 a couple of builds after the AX-HLE merge and it always takes a while for the issue to come up and I honestly do not know if the issue goes away after a while or not as once it starts I just stop playing for a while. It is ruining my playtime with these games honestly so in the mean time I am PCSX2 to catch up on some of my PS2 games since my PS2 will no longer read any discs.
I just played with 3.0 -077 and the issue persist but I cannot go back any further because that is the only build since 3.0 available on the skydrive. Anyone have any suggestions? I want to stress that my testing was strictly with LLE (fullspeed) and XAudio2 backend (without LLE on thread)
It's very interesting that this issue happens with old AX, new AX and LLE. That means it's unlikely to be a DSP emulation issue. If I can reproduce that locally, I'll try to debug it.
Stanger still is the fact that I remember playing Dolphin (using "dirty" builds) before and never has this issue come up. The folks experiencing the issue are using both ATI and Nvidia so it seems unlikely to be a driver or config issue with the graphics.
Delroth,
I will be testing 3.0 on my machine tomorrow night to see if I get the static. If I do then we know something else squirrely is going on. If not, it may indeed be some sort of "bug".
One thing to note is that, the distored sound would go away if I finished the mission, or changed map, basically something forced it to refresh/reload.
The looping issue would go away when the same audio was played again. IE: If the looping happens on the audio effect that mario enter the pipe, then the way to make the looping go away would be enter any of the pipe again to make the game play that same audio effect again.
I assume the latest build fixed this (static) issue :p
I can add the latest build to my list of tests sure! I will do that after I try 3.0 tonight and report back here.
Update: 3.0 does indeed have the same issue. Perhaps there was some update to Visual c++ Redistrib that is causing this? I have experienced the issue with DX 9 and OpenGL so I do not know if it is related to a DirectX update...
Update 2: I just finished with 3.5-184 and the static persists, but all the sound effects in Baten Kaitos were "lower". They had more bass in them versus any of the 10-12 revisions I have tried. Probably irrelevant but I will mention it anyway.
To be honest I am not sure if it wise to spend anymore time testing older builds until we hear back from the dev folks on this. Also if some folks aren't experiencing the issue, perhaps it may be pertinent to see what their specs (HW, OS, updates, etc) they have to see if that can help find the issue.
Wait...does anyone else have the OpenMG codec (SonicStage from Sony) installed? I have it for JPCSP and come to think of it, it would coincide with the sound issues appearing...
I do not have that installed have you tried the latest builds yet as there was a fix for this issue and wondering if it really fixes it or not from the limited tested I did earlier I did not get any static or funky audio.