Question Realtek audio driver makes 2 sec sound delay after at least 30 secs idle

Jul 8, 2020
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I bought a new Lenovo Ideapad S340 with AMD Radeon 5 and i had never experienced such an annoying audio problem that might appear to be unsolvable at all circumstances.
I was playing Spotify fine when i started noticing all the time that my audio started with 2 seconds playing nothing until it resumed. The same thing happens with basically every single windows application and it's becoming irritating. It doesn't delay but it produces silent sound.
I had to check solutions on google, but so far what i've tried did nothing at all out of frustration:
  • Uninstalling the Realtek Audio driver and restarting my computer.
  • Running Audio troubleshoot... which reveals nothing wrong at all.
  • Updating the driver with a generic High Definition Audio driver, which seemed to "solve" the problem but instead it makes a popping sound whenever it starts or stops the audio. Also irritating because it puts you off out of nowhere.
  • Performing a disk health check with command prompt.
  • And recently, in the Microsoft Community someone told me to change the power plan settings to "Ultimate Performance" and restart my pc. I did not believe it would solve the problem, and so it didn't help at all.
All of this is happening ONLY when i'm plugging in my headphones (my PC has only the headphone/microphone combo slot while there's a USB-C slot, i don't know if i could plug in an adapter to it). I checked if the problem persists without headphones and it doesn't seem to persist.
Right now i'm trying to download the drivers from the Realtek.com website to try to update them but the download is so slooow.

Sort of off-topic: Could it be that these days bluetooth headphones are better than wired headphones?:rolleyes:

EDIT: After watching a movie i realized that it seems to happen for at least 5 seconds after playing audio. hmmmm..
I also tried to install the driver from Realtek's website, however, it's a old 2017 driver version which isn't fully compatible, causing both headphones and computer speakers to play. Checking on the Realtek Audio Console app it says that my machine isn't supported. So i had to go back and reinstall the 2019 version that is included on my computer.
 
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Jul 8, 2020
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What headphones are you using? Are they wireless?
Headphone jack. The lenovo ideapad s340 has a headphone/microphone combo slot while there is a USB-C slot which i haven't used yet. I have a USB-C to 3.5mm adapter which my parents bought but no one used them.
When i plugged in the headphones Windows didn't recognize it as an additional audio device.
 
Feb 15, 2021
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Its a Realtek driver issue (sounds like your one might be a branded variant). To fix follow steps here: https://neosmart.net/wiki/fix-realtek-audio-delay-lag/

In short: uninstall it and replace with Microsoft's latest High Definition Audio Device Driver (mine was 10.0.19041.264 from 9/05/2020)

Device Manager > Sound, video and game controllers > Realtek Audio driver > Properties > Update driver > Browse my computer > Let me pick... > Untick "Show compatible hardware" > Pick Microsoft in Manufacturers list on left > replace with Microsoft's latest High Definition Audio Device Driver (mine was 10.0.19041.264 from 9/05/2020)