New Acer Predator 17 has constant ticking/static/white noise if headphones plugged into the jack.

accidentprone8

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Dec 16, 2017
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Bought on Black Friday, just set up Sunday. Plugged in headphones for the first time this week to watch some Stranger Things. Noticed an subtle ticking noise every half second or so with the headphones plugged in. Not an issue with my old laptop. Thus, troubleshooting began.

Computer: Predator G9-793 Windows 10 Home V 1709 OS 16299

Software: Realtek High Definition Audio 1.0.64.10 (new) Version 6.0.1.8186

Didn't write down what the old driver was before I reinstalled the driver.

Headphones: Sennheiser HD 380 pro

Second Headphones: Sennheiser OCX 685i (in ear sports headphones)

Third Headphones: Sennheiser On Ears:??? Probably Circa - 2008 or 2009. No model known.

What I have tried:

Plugging and unplugging the headphones.

Powering the computer on and off.

Touching metal objects to the computer.

Plugged and unplugged from the power.

Different outlets.

Muting the computer audio.

Switching to nvidia HDMI audio (no sound plays, ticking continues)

Disabling the drivers

Updating the drivers

With all of the above, the ticking continues.

WHAT WORKS (ish):

Smaller in ear sports headphones, the ticking is almost inaudible to the point where I thought I might be imagining it. White noise is still present to some extent (just fuzzyness).

Old generic on ear heaphones: Nothing. No white noise. No ticking.

The HD 380s do NOT tick on any other devices, including my amp. They DO give white noise on my old laptop.

I have a Google Pixel 2, so I have several USB C adaptors. Plugged my headphones into those and into the USB C port. NO TICKING.

Tried the Google adaptor again later on, and heard horrible crackling. Sharp cracks. Plugged into the headphone jack, same thing. Cracking changed in frequency after removing the computer from power.

That adaptor now cracks a bit when using it on my cell phone as intended. The computer on the other hand, recognizes it, but won't play audio through it.

Posted on Reddit, and someone suggested I buy a ZIOCOM Ground Loop Noise Isolator. I didn't think that would work, given that I had an issue with it removed from power sources...but lo and behold, it did work. No cracks, no ticking.

Do I have a lemon? I bought this from Costco. I can return it.

I would love to "solve" this, not just mitigate it. It doesn't seem to be a common issue with the Predator series from what I can tell.

Ideas?

Side note: Downloaded LatencyMon on recommendation of a Reddit post. HUGE spikes in latency, but I can't get it to give me the information it did at first boot (i.e. possible drivers and issue causers). I'm not too familiar with the program, so that's a piece of it.Taps out at 610 us to 3194 us depending on the load.