Latency Problems (Audio Drop Outs) on M4600 with Dell 11.13.51.0 Intel 82579LM Drivers

Thanks for posting this. I just received a new Precision M4600 and have been configuring it over the past couple of days. I found this "random audio glitch" with audio and video streams (the video is not interrupted, but the audio is). It sounds a bit like a record skipping. Unfortunately for me the network driver changes did not help the situation. I started with 11.13.51.0 (the original drivers), and then upgraded using the ones from the Intel site (v17.1 of the software, but it installed 11.16.96.0 drivers). I experienced the same problem, so I downgraded to 11.8.81.0 from the Dell site. After several minutes of uninterrupted play from Spotify, I got my hopes up... and then it started skipping/cutting out quite a lot.

I have an SSD with Encryption as well as a drive attached to the eSATA port. It seems to me that the audio interruptions might be due to hard drive access. At least, that's what I'll investigate next. This is a really expensive laptop (company purchase) and I've already had to replace the screen and deal with a domain networking problem. Dell's gonna be sick of hearing from me.

 

Dell M6600 here. Same problem - several dropouts per song. Replaced 82579LM driver with version 11.8.81.0 from Dell site. Pandora has been playing for over 3 hours now, with latencymon finally reporting "Your system appears to be suitable for handling real-time audio and other tasks without dropout". (Before I was seeing both kernel timer latency and DPC routine execution time going all the way through the red.)

Yay! :thumbsup:

Thanks.