Popping at the end of sound files

Recently we upgraded to Unity 5.2 (from 4) and now I notice that some sound files playing have a audible "pop" at the end. The pop, however, is not preset in the sound file itself - just when it's played in the editor. Not all sounds though. Just some. Any idea what's going on or what to do? I have them as .wavs and auditioning them through Unity yields no pops. Only running the game in editor.

 

We saw this problem after upgrading a project from Unity 4 to 5 as well. Interested in hearing why this happens and how to fix it.

 

Same issue in Unity 5.3
Temporary solved by changing Load type to "Streaming"

 

Here as well. Sound file is zeroed at the end, doesn't matter what format I use or whether it's decompressed on load/streamed etc, still pops.

 

Thought I was going insane. I've been seeing this as well, exactly as you described it, though I don't think I noticed it as far back as last December.

 

Same here.

 

If you can reproduce the issue, Unity Technologies would probably be interested to look at it if you submit a bug-report, following their guidelines in this document.

 

I believe I can reproduce it with a new project, will take a look at that.
For now, the problem is solved (or rather, worked around) by using ADPCM import settings.

 

Interesting, and annoying.

I am experiencing the clicks at the end of some audio files (confirmed to be at 0 volume faded out at the end) too. If I resample from 44.1 kHz to 48 kHz in an external editor and re-import the audio the problem goes away for that audio file but not sure if that is just a coincidence because other 44.1 kHz audio files are fine. For me changing from "Decompress On Load" to either "Streaming" or "Compressed In Memory" works around the problem... but I would rather solve it =)

Was there ever a bug reported for this issue?

 

Did you ever figure out what was causing this issue?

I think that I'm having the same exact problem. This only happens when using "Decompress on Load." It also happens on sound clips that are at zero volume at the end of the clip, even before the end of the clip, but it doesn't seem to happen to all sound clips. This also happens in a blank project with just an audio source and a sound firing on awake. I also tried on another computer with a different sound card, same issue.

"Streaming" or "Compressed In Memory" seems to completely fix it. Using "Decompress on Load" and increasing the bitrate to 48 KHz seems to dampen the popping sound, but not get rid of it. Using lower rates seems to exacerbate the issue. Playing around in the project's audio settings does not fix it.

 

I came across this problem when creating audio clips manually from waveforms (e.g. sine waves, square waves) to generate sound effects. At 44.1kHz, however much silence I added at the end of the wave, there was always a click when the audio clip finished.

I solved it by ensuring there was also silence at the beginning of the wave. Literally one sample will do - it just has to be 0 at the start. I can't explain why - maybe the audio clip loops back to the beginning for a single sample when it finishes, but either way it solved it for me.

 

I keep running across this issue and can confirm the cause is an audio clip starting at something other than 0 volume. It is strange how the popping is heard at the end of the clip and nothing in other applications, even the preview in Unity.
The fix is to edit the offending audio clip to start at 0 (in both left and right channels) and have a small gap of silence before the wave starts.


* I suspect its caused by the compression as playing the preview is likely an uncompressed wave, that explains why we don't hear it there.

 

that hack fixed it Thanks. I think somebody need to make bug report or we will witness this bug another 5 years

 

mp3's will cause popping in unity (actually a delay before it starts playing causing a popping sound). Don't use mp3's! If you do, at least fade them in and out with scripting as a work-around, or better yet, make sure the file is a wav or ogg.

 

According to this answer, the issue seems to be related to .mp3 assets only. Why don't you use .wav files instead?

 

i have no idea why mp3 format is so ingrained in common unconsciousness that ogg/vorbis - which has better quality/compression ratio, (supposedly) sounds better in lower bitrates and - most importantly - doesn't suffer this frame rounding error - isn't even mentioned in cases like these
so that's worth a try

 

For future reference,I'm experiencing the same problem with a Vorbis file. Tried every Load type/Compression format combination, the clicking is the same.
The clicking is only happening in Unity.

 

I use .wav but the problem still happens when the sound file doesn't start at "0" volume

 

.ogg/vorbis files absolutely experience this bug, wavs as well. Making sure there is no signal at the very start of the file seems to avoid it.

 

Still happens in 2023. I have some .wav sounds and still POPs when finish the sound. The even have fadeout but still happens, only in Unity, in other players or audioeditors doesn't happen.

 

The thread is outdated but if for someone the problem is still actual.

In my case crackling was randomly appear during 3 minute long mp3 audio playing in 2d UI. Configuration aduio asset didn't help. After some time of investigation I figured out that the root cause in particles (it was used as background for canvas) .

By the way the issue is still wasn't fixed even in 2023.2 : https://issuetracker.unity3d.com/is...and-the-audio-playable-asset-has-loop-enabled


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The problem is still relevant.
The sound click disappears if the beginning of the sound wave is reduced to zero:

 

This is traditionally good advice. The first sample and the last sample of a sound should be zero to avoid any pop (because think about it, the speaker position is at zero before the first sample, and wants to return to zero after the last sample). You showed a closeup of how to fix the beginning of a sound clip. People should also do the end of the sound clip the same way, fading to zero or otherwise massaging the sound so that it happens to be at zero at the last sample.

Unfortunately, the weak sampling algorithm Unity uses can skip samples, and any time you're decoding from a lossy compressed audio format like mp3 (which is the vast majority of sounds packed into a mobile Unity game), the samples can be changed to suit the compression.

The answer is to have a zero for several samples at the beginning (long enough to force compression and sampling to see a real zero), and many samples at the end (long enough that any pitch bending effects are also forced to see a real zero when the play position is nearing the end). I generally use about 0.1 seconds worth of purely zero tail, and a little less at the head.

 

Even at zero for .1s at the beginning of the sound and the end, there's still a small distinct pop at the end of a specific .ogg file. Extremely weird.

 

I had the same problem, but after deleting the audio reverb filter on my object and changing it to an audio reverb zone the popping is gone. Maybe it will help someone

 

This was the only solution that worked for me! Thanks @Xyloven

 

Simple fix, just use AudioSource.PlayOneShot(AudioClip clip); instead of AudioSource.Play();

Nothing else is required.

 

A little definite pop may still be heard at the conclusion of a particular.ogg file, even at zero for the.1s at the beginning and end of the sound. really strange