The problem with the latency / lag and 5.1 Audio Out - and the modded drivers

[[S]]

My recommendation is using a digital uncompressed connection (hdmi) and Decide on the avr side if you want additional audio processing or not.
Also i dont Think it makes any measureable difference how the dac is connected (pcie or not)

 

[ador250]

Any kind of software rendered or enhancement will create latency. The reason why Realtek default and Nvidia hdmi default don't have latency bcoz the sound processing (specially enhancements) is done by their own chip, something like hardware acceleration.

 

[CityCultivator]

Realtek direct Toslink compression and the decompression on the other side should be something like 40-60ms. As long as you dont use a creative soundblaster i think it might be ok.

By the way: Has your htib multichannel in?

Only has optical.
I use only for movie watching; not much of a gamer.

 

[Buzzingbee]

Hello, I was also interested with audio latency on AV receiver. I do not use AV receiver for main video connection, so video latency is not important for me. Throughout two years I've been gathering rough experiment results so I thought I would like to share here:

DENON AVR-1909
Analog in : +8ms
Analog in Direct: +0ms
Optical in (Stereo PCM) : +20ms
Optical in Direct: +2ms
HDMI in : +20ms
HDMI in Direct: +0ms

Surround upmixer (extra latency on top of connection type)
Dolby Pro Logic IIx: +6ms

SONY DA5300ES
Analog in: +15ms
Analog direct: +0ms
Optical in (stereo PCM): +10ms
HDMI in: +10ms

Surround upmixer
Dolby Pro Logic IIx: +6ms
Neural Surround (alternative to PLIIx): +20ms

YAMAHA RX-A3040
Analog in : +40ms
Analog in with Pure Direct : +0ms
Optical in (stereo PCM) : +70ms
HDMI: +20ms

Surround upmixer
Pro Logic IIx (PCM) : +20ms
Dolby Surround Upmixer (PCM) : +35ms
Pro Logic IIx (analog) +8ms
Dolby Surround Upmixer (analog) +20ms

Note:
- I included surround upmixer results as I mainly use it for 5.1 sound upmixed to 7.1.
- All digital connection types are connected with highest sample rate possible (192khz). I found out higher sample rate may improve audio latency, more details later below. Bit depth doesn't affect latency.

I did not include Dolby Digital Live, DTS connect and Dolby Atmos yet as these latency are bad enough I tend to avoid all of it. I am guessing they add around extra 100-150ms.

I can confirm Realtek does not add extra latency and I also made it as baseline.

Onto sound cards, I tried to turn off extra processing as much as I can. Here are the results of sound cards I tested:

Creative Sound Blaster Titanium analog output: +20ms
Creative Sound Blaster Omni analog output: +40ms

I tested Toslink with stereo PCM from Creative SB Titanium with no audio latency. I also recall briefly testing optical for Asus Xonar SE and recorded latency of +10ms. I don't have Omni anymore so I don't have result for optical connection.

I then decided to test some ordinary desktop DACs (not gaming DAC).

Topping D10: USB in, analog output: +0ms
Audioengine D1: USB in, analog output: +0ms
Cambridge Audio Dacmagic Plus: USB in, analog output: +5ms

Note:
- All DACs were tested with highest sample rate possible.
- If available, buffer size were set to lowest possible. Not recommended for normal use as audio may pop and crackle.

So it looked like desktop DACs with USB input are in the clear with latency (but more DACs need further testing to be absolutely sure).

From then I decided to experiment something new just incase I get asked. I decided to find out latency differences when swapping sample rate. This is true for my AV receiver and it is noticeably different. Here is the result.

Yamaha RX-A3040:
HDMI 192khz: +20ms
HDMI 96khz: +40ms
HDMI 48Khz: +50ms

I reconnected my other AV receivers briefly for the same test and did comparison between 48khz and 192khz.

Denon AVR-1909: 3ms difference
Sony DA5300ES: 0ms difference

The latency difference on Denon is very insignificant it is barely any different. On the other hand, Yamaha's latency is significant enough that I had to set at 192khz just to improve audio latency.

Next test, here is the result of swapping speaker layout using HDMI:

YAMAHA RX-A3040:
Stereo: +70ms
Quadraphonic: +70ms
Surround: +20ms
3.1 Surround: +20ms
5.1 Surround: +20ms
7.1 Surround: +20ms

Latency of stereo output actually stumped me. 70ms would become unacceptable for gaming. But I also noticed when comparing from previous result, it is the same latency as Toslink PCM. So I was thinking stereo PCM have more latency than multichannel PCM. Curious, I retested my two other AV receivers.

HDMI Stereo PCM
Denon AVR-1909: +20ms, same result as 5.1/7.1.
Sony DA5300ES: +50ms, 40ms worse than 5.1/7.1.

This got me more confused than ever. My Denon AV receiver is immune to extra latency when comparing stereo and multichannel PCM on HDMI, while Sony & Yamaha slapped off extra noticeable latency. For Sony receiver it is better off using optical for stereo PCM, and my Yamaha receiver is bad either way the best solution is analog connection.

Going back on topic, I am able to come into similar conclusions as yours.
- Multi-channel HDMI latency is low and indeed is the best option for multi channel.
- Multi-channel analog input is a gamble depending on sound card.
- Both Dolby Digital Live and DTS connect via Toslink have horrible latency and should be avoided.
- Dolby Atmos in gaming may be also be as bad as DDL & DTS connect, but I don't have the numbers. If interested I can help test all bitstreaming results when I have spare time.
- Higher sampling rate on PCM may improve audio latency. It did for my Yamaha AV receiver.
- AV receiver latency is too unpredictable overall.

 

[[S]]

Thanks for sharing buzzingbee.
Greate that you had a chance to test more avrs.
Everytime something gets converted (which affect 5.1 -> stereo or 192khz > ) produce latency - so two things seems to matter: get less things converted as possible, get things converted as fast as possible. As you said, the latter thing cant be known.
I am wondering how you exactly measured your results?

 

[Buzzingbee]

I also record the gap between mouse click and sound from speaker/headphones. One method I done was on sound properties I added any event (e.g. Close Program) with sound then clicking Test button. Another method was running Titanfall 2 tutorial. Both results are equal.

There is mouse input lag range of +-8ms so it was tricky to find accurate number.

I have tried to record Dolby Atmos in the past but I haven't yet find a game that is reliable. For example Borderlands 3 support Dolby Atmos, but it has its own input lag range that became overall +-15ms ish instead of usual +-8ms.

As for stereo on my AV receiver, it was directly stereo and has that odd +70ms total latency. I also tried to convert 7.1 to stereo on my AV receiver which gives extra +20ms delay (totalling 40ms). But yeah, avoid converting as much as possible for best latency results.

 

[Nisargadatta]

Any idea if connecting headphones directly to pc monitor audio output (HDMI) would cause less delay vs onboard realtek audio from the motherboard?

I tested both with latencymon and didn't see any difference but I'm interested in your opinion.

 

[deama]

Thanks for sharing buzzingbee.
Greate that you had a chance to test more avrs.
Everytime something gets converted (which affect 5.1 -> stereo or 192khz > ) produce latency - so two things seems to matter: get less things converted as possible, get things converted as fast as possible. As you said, the latter thing cant be known.
I am wondering how you exactly measured your results?

Hello, I was also interested with audio latency on AV receiver. I do not use AV receiver for main video connection, so video latency is not important for me. Throughout two years I've been gathering rough experiment results so I thought I would like to share here:

I'm having some trouble and was wondering if someone could help me?
I've got my HDMI cable connected to my TV from my PC, but after measuring the audio delay, it says I've got about 90ms?! I've got all processing on the TV side disabled apart from Dolby Atmos, but if I disable Dolby Atmos it only gives me -9ms.
I have a usb DAC and when I measure the audio from it via headphones, it gives me roughly 73ms, which is kinda meh but at least it's lower.
If however, I measure with my onboard audio (just connect headphones to my motherboard 3.5mm jack), it gives me about 53ms! At least that is acceptable (my video latency is about 44ms).

However the onboard audio doesn't sound that good (I did some tests and I can notice a lower quality) than my TV's or my DAC's sound. Regardless though, it's not like I can use it anyway as my USB DAC only takes an input of USB, and my TV only takes an input from HDMI (I think, at least I can't see any jacks).
Does anyone have any clue how to fix this? I'd like to get at least about 50ms audio delay.

It's not the headphones, I've tried different types of headphones and they all give pretty much same results.

The way I do my tests is I open up audacity, generate a sine wave, then create a new track and record from the beginning. Essentially it playbacks the sinewave as fast as it can, whilst recording at the same time and I calculate the ms difference by simply looking at the difference from the beginning.

Any help?

 

[Ferather]

I feel bad, I get instant response, feels like 2ms or less, its faster than my internet @ 4ms, both on Realtek SPDIF, and GPU HDMI, even GPU HDMI to SPDIF.
I do know some some enhancers, spatial enhancers and even faulty settings either in the driver or registry, can cause audio delay.

 

[deama]

I feel bad, I get instant response, feels like 2ms or less, its faster than my internet @ 4ms, both on Realtek SPDIF, and GPU HDMI, even GPU HDMI to SPDIF.
I do know some some enhancers, spatial enhancers and even faulty settings either in the driver or registry, can cause audio delay.

How'd you measure the delay?
But yeah, this upsets me, though I'm not sure it's my windows as I measured at a friend's place and it wasn't great either. I tried a fresh copy of windows too, but same problem.

 

[Ferather]

I cant say I really measure it, I do it based on screen and sound timings when a popup and sound alert play at the same time.
You see the popup, adding enough delay is then noticeable when the popup is in front of the sound.

 

[deama]

I cant say I really measure it, I do it based on screen and sound timings when a popup and sound alert play at the same time.
You see the popup, adding enough delay is then noticeable when the popup is in front of the sound.

Ah, I see, so in my case I'd probably have something like 45ms difference or so. If I use my onboard audio then I can get it to about 5-10ms difference, but I don't think I can feed that to my DAC, nor can I feed it to my TV.

Any registry tweaks you can recommend for audio latency or any audio latency related thing?

 

[Ferather]

No unfortunately, I can only recommend a different driver if there is that much of a difference, sorry.

Edit:

There is one thing you can try, and install E-APO, and set to pre-mix no post mix.
It can increase the response rate, see my post here to install it.

When I was building DTS DCH, at the start there was a lot of lag, E-APO fixed it.
It's not needed in that way now, only as a stereo upmixer.

Might work for you too.

 

[deama]

No unfortunately, I can only recommend a different driver if there is that much of a difference, sorry.

Edit:

There is one thing you can try, and install E-APO, and set to pre-mix no post mix.
It can increase the response rate, see my post here to install it.

When I was building DTS DCH, at the start there was a lot of lag, E-APO fixed it.
It's not needed in that way now, only as a stereo upmixer.

Might work for you too.

I'll try that.

I've also ordered some audio input to HDMI output (I think), I'll give that a go as I think I found a way to output audio from one HDMI to another's video, but I don't have an integrated GPU so I can't test it per say.

EDIT: Nope, the equalizer stuff didn't do anything, other than reducing my audio by about 6db.

 

[Ferather]

That was the only trick I had, oh well sorry.

 

[deama]

So I just took like some sort of audio to HDMI converter thing, plugged the RCA left/right from my computer to the device, then the HDMI out to the HDMI in on my TV and it worked!
However it only worked on that HDMI port, when I tried to figure out how to get it to work on my GPU HDMI, it wouldn't work...
I guess I can get some sort of HDMI splicer or something that combines the audio/video signals of 2 HDMIs, but that's probably going to add input lag, who knows...
I guess I'll have to give up on this, can't find any more info...

 

[Ferather]

I Find SPDIF and HDMI is more responsive than analogue direct, I use my AMD GPU as my main sound device via HDMI extractor to SPDIF.
My Z906 doesn't have HDMI support, and SPDIF is always better than analogue direct, regardless of the programming.

With my extractor I can output 5.1 PCM to SPDIF, but my Z906 doesn't support more than 2 channel SPDIF PCM.
The strange part is, DTS Interactive is only 1.5mbps, and still sounds better than lossless analogue.

 

[deama]

I Find SPDIF and HDMI is more responsive than analogue direct, I use my AMD GPU as my main sound device via HDMI extractor to SPDIF.
My Z906 doesn't have HDMI support, and SPDIF is always better than analogue direct, regardless of the programming.

With my extractor I can output 5.1 PCM to SPDIF, but my Z906 doesn't support more than 2 channel SPDIF PCM.
The strange part is, DTS Interactive is only 1.5mbps, and still sounds better than lossless analogue.

Hold on, can you explain your setup in more detail? As far as I can tell, you've got a HDMI from your AMD GPU linked to your monitor/tv and you use the sound from your monitor/tv or do you have a line going from your monitor/tv to your sound system and that's how you use it?
What is this SPDIF?

 

[Ferather]

AMD GPU (HDMI) > Extractor > SPDIF > Z906 Receiver. SPDIF is what was before HDMI, its a digital interface.

Toslink vs Optical: What is The Difference? | Finddiffer.com (ignore the doesn't support lossless, it does)

 

[deama]

AMD GPU (HDMI) > Extractor > SPDIF > Z906 Receiver. SPDIF is what was before HDMI, its a digital interface.

Toslink vs Optical: What is The Difference? | Finddiffer.com (ignore the doesn't support lossless, it does)

Is that the one that gives you low latency? What is this extractor you use?
Where do you get your video output then? Or do you have 2 HDMI cables running from your GPU, one to the Extractor, and another to the monitor/tv?

 

[Ferather]

The HDMI portion passes through, here is the unit I have, ignore the typo 1GB its 18GB for video, HDMI audio is ~37mpbs, the older ARC is much lower.
I made my own driver for the unit, effectively overriding the EDID, I can send 5.1-7.1 down SPDIF, and also all formats.

You don't need an extractor to send lossless formats on SPDIF, just some settings in the media player.

 

[deama]

The HDMI portion passes through, here is the unit I have, ignore the typo 1GB its 18GB for video, HDMI audio is ~37mpbs, the older ARC is much lower.
I made my own driver for the unit, effectively overriding the EDID, I can send 5.1-7.1 down SPDIF, and also all formats.

You don't need an extractor to send lossless formats on SPDIF, just some settings in the media player.

Ah, I see, perhaps my problem then is my TV adding most of the latency, but hmm, I've got all sound enhancing stuff disabled.
Have you dabbled in soundbars? Any recommendations or any of them that you know of that have low latency and good audio quality?

 

[Ferather]

perhaps my problem then is my TV adding most of the latency

That's possible, I have read ARC and eARC can be unstable, and you then require sync features. Never needed sync with Toslink, so, yes maybe its the TV.

Have you dabbled in soundbars? Any recommendations or any of them that you know of that have low latency and good audio quality?

I have not no, I am not looking to upgrade my Z906 at this time, not unless I see proper SPDIF support, the current standard is 20-125mbps (modules).
Most OEM's don't support SPDIF at its current standard, which I believe was the late 90's, they reference the 1983 standard (3.1mbps).

I am not at all interested in HDMI for audio purposes, only the programming and support it has.
The newest optical modules do 250mbps in duplex and can carry internet.

 

[deama]

That's possible, I have read ARC and eARC can be unstable, and you then require sync features. Never needed sync with Toslink, so, yes maybe its the TV.

I have an eARC slot, that's my HDMI 2 slot, but I've got mine hooked up to my HDMI 1 slot as that's recommended for PC usage.
Would hooking it up to my eARC slot make it work better?

 

[Ferather]

Pass, I don't know the answer, give it a go, why not?