Help! Something's wrong with my Axe-Fx III and I can't figure it out. High pitched squeal

just noticed such a thing. when playing audio from my PC on ax fx 10 and 11 firmware - the Output buffer level gradually drops to 0 and short-term high-frequency artifacts appear. then the scale again rises to the middle and again begins to fall smoothly ...
 
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Leonid said:
just noticed such a thing. when playing audio from my PC on ax fx 10 and 11 firmware - the Output buffer level gradually drops to 0 and short-term high-frequency artifacts appear. then the scale again rises to the middle and again begins to fall smoothly ...
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That means you have to increase your buffer size.
 
@Leonid I will highlight that I have experienced this issue at the lowest and the highest buffer settings on 3 separate computers all with different compute capacity. In every case I've tried it, just the act of changing the buffer setting on the AXE has (very temporarily, sometimes just for a few seconds) fixed it.
 
My problem is resolved. When changing the buffer size on Ax, you need to stop data transfer via USB. And it’s better to just disconnect the usb cable. Earlier, I heard artifacts in sound even with a buffer size of 256. Now there are no artifacts at 32 and the meter of the output buffer is always in the middle. As I said earlier, artifacts appeared at a time when the meter of the output buffer was at around “0”
 
In one of your videos, I noticed that you have some nvidia audio drivers installed...which comes with the standard nvidia driver install.
I had somewhat similar problems a while ago with a usb sound card. Had no idea why. It just started one day.
After trying almost everything I uninstalled all nvidia drivers and reinstalled with custom settings, disabling all audio driver install.
Job done....everything was ok after that.
Don't know is this will help you, but worth a try :)

Cheers
 
Leonid said:
My problem is resolved. When changing the buffer size on Ax, you need to stop data transfer via USB. And it’s better to just disconnect the usb cable. Earlier, I heard artifacts in sound even with a buffer size of 256. Now there are no artifacts at 32 and the meter of the output buffer is always in the middle. As I said earlier, artifacts appeared at a time when the meter of the output buffer was at around “0”
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Yes the meter should hover near the middle.
 
I have had the same problem since I got my first AXE FX III unit. It is so frustrating you have no idea, especially when recording and laying tracks! I will just a buffer size and see if that fixes it. I sure hope it does!
 
@dongzo thank you so much for your input. I was getting this problem on 3 different computers, one of which was linux (and had no nvidia drivers installed (this is also shown in one of the videos)).

I will also update that while I haven't been using the Axe a whole lot lately, it's been a good long while since I had the problem.

I recently, as part of another studio upgrade, switched some things around and plugged the axe into a furman M-8Dx, which is then plugged into an APC SMT750RM2UC Uninterruptible power supply. Since then... I haven't heard the problem. I will note that it can't be this alone since I'm fairly certain that when I tested it with my linux machine (which is also on another battery backup) it was plugged into the battery backup here as well (and still had the problem).

I've also upgrade to the latest firmwares as they've come along so perhaps that also has something to do with it.

I think I've just come to accept that, whatever the problem is, if it comes back.. it'll just never be fixed since it is too risky to spend all the money to send it out to Fractal just for them to not be able to reproduce the problem - which I would wager is a likely case because it happens so intermittently. Also.. they seem like good honest people and I don't want to waste their time.
 
Mine does the same thing, high pitch wine floating in the background, ruining your takes and annoying as hell. Def a fractal thing.

if you put a Gate block in the signal chain and mute your strings the gate removes the high pitch wine / feedback. Pretty simple really,

I’d also like to point out that it happens using just the AX3 in stand alone, as well as when recording. I notice it more during recording for the simple reason you’re hearing playback.

Thanks for the suggestions everyone, super helpful. However, you really shouldn’t need to mess around with buffer size, word clock, tearing you rig apart etc to get a clean (noise free) sound out of a very expensive bit of gear. This is Fractal issue and a deal breaker for some.

The FX3 is completely unusable in a professional studio setting because of this issue, it makes each take a digital hot mess. Great if you’re messing around, but professionally, no where near the quality of a quiet analogue rig,
 
The Wookie said:
Mine does the same thing, high pitch wine floating in the background, ruining your takes and annoying as hell. Def a fractal thing.

if you put a Gate block in the signal chain and mute your strings the gate removes the high pitch wine / feedback. Pretty simple really,

I’d also like to point out that it happens using just the AX3 in stand alone, as well as when recording. I notice it more during recording for the simple reason you’re hearing playback.

Thanks for the suggestions everyone, super helpful. However, you really shouldn’t need to mess around with buffer size, word clock, tearing you rig apart etc to get a clean (noise free) sound out of a very expensive bit of gear. This is Fractal issue and a deal breaker for some.

The FX3 is completely unusable in a professional studio setting because of this issue, it makes each take a digital hot mess. Great if you’re messing around, but professionally, no where near the quality of a quiet analogue rig,
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There are thousands of users who don't have this issue. I use mine every day and never have this problem. What you are describing sounds like a USB ground loop.
 
I paid 2,500 dollars for a faulty unit. That's all there is too it. If I were to have sent it back during the time it was covered under warranty I would have been taking the large chance (since shipping is not free to send it back) of the tech at fractal audio just might not happen to see it. Sometimes it goes days and days without having the problem and sometimes it's happening every 5 minutes.

It's a rare problem (and an intermittent one, which is the worst part) but I have isolated literally every other factor other than my house's mains power. I have changed the usb cable, used different computers with different operating systems and completely different drivers, heck I even swapped out the power cable itself. I'm a software engineer by trade and isolating variables to debug something is something I would hope I know how to do. If I can git bisect production kubernetes nodes with applications with hundreds of thousands of active users to find an obscure C++ bug, I would hope I could determine whether this problem is or isn't the axe unit. It's my unit.

@FractalAudio your statement "I use mine every day and never have this problem." argument is a clear logical fallacy. And so is your statement that thousands of users exist that don't experience this problem. I have heavily documented every step of debugging I went through to demonstrate that there is no other external factor (again, other than the literal power supplied to my house - I even made sure to try using different circuit breakers!). You have committed an extrapolation error by concluding that since other people don't have this problem with their unit that all people don't have this problem with their unit. I have it. It's rare and if I have to guess I'd say it's a hardware issue with the clock. Some day if it bothers me enough I may try replacing the clock on my own now that it's out of warranty.

Despite the fallacious reasoning, I completely agree with @FractalAudio, @The Wookie, what you described doesn't sound like what I'm experiencing. Here are my reasons for thinking that:
  1. My unit's issue only affects usb audio when the axe is used in standalone mode. It has not, so far as I can tell, ever affected the guitar processing.
  2. Although I use it more for playing than for tracking (so I could be wrong about this) I don't believe it has ever occurred during tracking. If I am recording guitars and the issue occurs it will not be printed on the the track.
  3. My issue is immediately affected by changing the buffer size in many cases. It happens with the largest possible buffer and with the smallest possible buffer about equally, so far as I can tell.
  4. I have had the issue you are describing in the past with other gear and a ground loop was my issue in that case.
As a friendly aside, @The Wookie, the axe has a ground lift button on the back. Maybe give that a try and report back.

It's a beautiful piece of gear, I just got incredibly unlucky it seems. Edge cases do exist, and I seem to be one of them. Fractal Audio sources their parts from upstream suppliers and the upstream suppliers' quality control processes can't be perfect. I'm stuck with it now so it is what it is.
 
Happens to me too. It only lasts a couple seconds and only pops up when I'm playing audio from Youtube or Itunes, doesn't happen at all in Logic. If it happened more, I'd be pissed about it but it hasn't bothered me enough to even bother sorting it out.

To be fair, I also drove a vehicle without AC in South Florida for two years and, in general, take a "If it's not completely stopping me from what I want to do, I can blow it off." approach to everything in life.
 
RevDrucifer said:
Happens to me too. It only lasts a couple seconds and only pops up when I'm playing audio from Youtube or Itunes, doesn't happen at all in Logic.
Click to expand...

That's very interesting. I don't have Logic but I can say that for sure playback in Ableton and ProTools and Bitwig are all affected when the problem is happening (again, not direct monitoring of the guitar itself, but when I listen back to anything else).

It's perhaps very important to note that I'm not using any other audio interface. I suspect this is part of the reason there are not tons of people noticing this problem because if I weren't using the axe as an audio interface I would not even know that it's happening.

That's part of the reason I didn't take the risk of sending it in repair, because I know eventually I'll get an interface for the setup that currently has the axe. Just gotta wait for RME to update the UFX+, haha.
 
my problem is exactly the same. I have been suffering with this for about a year. Indeed, the problem is only when the device works as a USB audio interface.
 
The Wookie said:
Mine does the same thing, high pitch wine floating in the background, ruining your takes and annoying as hell. Def a fractal thing.

if you put a Gate block in the signal chain and mute your strings the gate removes the high pitch wine / feedback. Pretty simple really,

I’d also like to point out that it happens using just the AX3 in stand alone, as well as when recording. I notice it more during recording for the simple reason you’re hearing playback.

Thanks for the suggestions everyone, super helpful. However, you really shouldn’t need to mess around with buffer size, word clock, tearing you rig apart etc to get a clean (noise free) sound out of a very expensive bit of gear. This is Fractal issue and a deal breaker for some.

The FX3 is completely unusable in a professional studio setting because of this issue, it makes each take a digital hot mess. Great if you’re messing around, but professionally, no where near the quality of a quiet analogue rig,
Click to expand...
If the gate removes the noise it means the noise is coming from your guitar, it's not the axe fx.
From your description it sounds like EM interference which might be coming from your PC or other electronic devices. Try moving your guitar away
 
FractalAudio said:
There are thousands of users who don't have this issue. I use mine every day and never have this problem. What you are describing sounds like a USB ground loop.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the suggestion, not a USB ground loop though unfortunately feedback present in stand alone mode. I don't use the FX3 as an interface, I run all audio into an Apollo.

The FX3 is literally the only piece of gear I own that generates noise like this. I've heard similar things on the Helix and Kemper and to my ears it sounds digital. I was hoping that perhaps it was EMI noise, but it's present everywhere. Tried a bunch of different guitars and pickup configurations, passive / active pups, silent P90's, swapped out cables, swapped power outlets / power conditioners, moved rack / unit away from all electrical devices, tried wireless / non wireless.

I get it, most wouldn't notice it and nobody wants to hear that their FX3 might have a similar issue, but it's there and it's on the Fractal. I will also say it could just be my unit, who knows. For live shows or mucking around the FX3 is phenomenal, I love it it's a beast. However, in a studio environment it's a big problem, and I've moved mine all over the place to different studios and locations, same issue every where I go to the point where I have to replicate in analogue.
 
The Wookie said:
Thanks for the suggestion, not a USB ground loop though unfortunately feedback present in stand alone mode. I don't use the FX3 as an interface, I run all audio into an Apollo.

The FX3 is literally the only piece of gear I own that generates noise like this. I've heard similar things on the Helix and Kemper and to my ears it sounds digital. I was hoping that perhaps it was EMI noise, but it's present everywhere. Tried a bunch of different guitars and pickup configurations, passive / active pups, silent P90's, swapped out cables, swapped power outlets / power conditioners, moved rack / unit away from all electrical devices, tried wireless / non wireless.

I get it, most wouldn't notice it and nobody wants to hear that their FX3 might have a similar issue, but it's there and it's on the Fractal. I will also say it could just be my unit, who knows. For live shows or mucking around the FX3 is phenomenal, I love it it's a beast. However, in a studio environment it's a big problem, and I've moved mine all over the place to different studios and locations, same issue every where I go to the point where I have to replicate in analogue.
Click to expand...

Perhaps ask around in your area for someone who also has an Axe-Fx, bring that one to your studio, and check the issue persists?
 
The Wookie said:
Thanks for the suggestion, not a USB ground loop though unfortunately feedback present in stand alone mode. I don't use the FX3 as an interface, I run all audio into an Apollo.

The FX3 is literally the only piece of gear I own that generates noise like this. I've heard similar things on the Helix and Kemper and to my ears it sounds digital. I was hoping that perhaps it was EMI noise, but it's present everywhere. Tried a bunch of different guitars and pickup configurations, passive / active pups, silent P90's, swapped out cables, swapped power outlets / power conditioners, moved rack / unit away from all electrical devices, tried wireless / non wireless.

I get it, most wouldn't notice it and nobody wants to hear that their FX3 might have a similar issue, but it's there and it's on the Fractal. I will also say it could just be my unit, who knows. For live shows or mucking around the FX3 is phenomenal, I love it it's a beast. However, in a studio environment it's a big problem, and I've moved mine all over the place to different studios and locations, same issue every where I go to the point where I have to replicate in analogue.
Click to expand...
If you turn down the volume knob on your guitar is the noise still there?
 
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