Audio clicks/pops on playback (wordclock related?)

[Fivestringcult]

Hi all, I'm new to the forum as you can tell. Been running a single rehearsal room and recording there when I can get the business for a couple of years now.

Before I get to my problem, I'll run down a bit of background info about my rig: For the desk, I'm currently running a Behringer DDX3216. Yeah you can laugh if you want, but everyone has to start somewhere, right? I've got some pretty decent results out of it so far, although I do have my eyes on a Mackie Onyx 800R and a PreSonus Digimax FS as possible preamp upgrades when I'm in a better financial position.
Now the excuses for that are out the way, I'm running it into an RME HDSP 9652 card via ADAT, with Cubase SX3 for the DAW.

The problem I'm having is that when playing back recorded audio in Cubase under the RME card's lower latency settings (ie: 1.5ms, 3ms), I'm getting a lot of pops and crackles in the sound. Thing is though, it's not recorded to the tracks themselves - it doesn't always occur in the same places, and when I bump the latency up to the higher end of the scale it disappears completely. As such, it's not much of an issue by the mixing stage, but it can be a bit distracting during tracking.

I don't know a lot about wordclocks so I have no idea if that is what's causing the problem, but it's currently my best guess. At the moment I'm using the Behringer desk as clock master, so would it make any difference/cause any other potential problems during tracking if I were to use the RME 9652 as master instead? I've heard that it's normally better to use the A/D converter end as clock master if possible. Oh yeah, I'm also using the ADAT I/O for the clock sync rather than BNC cables. Could this be another issue?

Hmmm. Pretty long first post. Sorry all.

 

[MetalWorks]

First off, I have the Nuendo/RME 9652 and had the exact same problems.

Except you say its only durring playback and not on the actual track.

My setup had clicks and pops and it was 100% in the track.

It burned onto the CD that way and was always in the same spots.

In fact I could zoom in and see them.

But it sounds exactly as you described.

My setup was the 9652 and 2 Nuendo/RME 96K 8 I/O AD/DA converters.

I tryed switching between using the 9652 as master, using the 96K 8 I/O as master, changing the latency, but nothing helped.

Then...

I bought BNC cables.

Set my 9652 as Master and switched everything else to External Clock.

Clicks and Pops dissappeared.

Maybe I had 1 click in an entire song.

Where as before I had one every 10 seconds.

Funny thing is that it was always on the Guitars only.

And it was always the worst on a part of the song where guitar played by itself or was really standing out.

Try the BNC if its an option.

Since switching to Pro Tools HD, Absolutely no clicks or pops.

:Smokin:

 

[Fivestringcult]

I'll give that a shot. Like you said, my problem is different to yours in that the clicks aren't recorded onto the audio itself, but it's still worth a try. Thanks for the help dude.