bazzite Audio stuttering in many games in Gamescope w/ 6700XT

Describe the bug

I have been using bazzite since before Fedora 39 with this system, and I'm not sure when, but in the last few months the system has developed frequent audio stutters when running games. A number of users with 6700XT's have described similar issues -- in my case the audio just cuts out without any static for just a moment and does so very frequently in many games. Some games are impacted more than others. The stuttering is much more frequent when running games via Gamescope vs. launching them from the desktop. I also run the Kodi Flatpak through Steam in Gamescope and it doesn't ever have any audio stutter.

A few badly impacted games:

What the Golf
Crazy Taxi
PowerWash Simulator

What did you expect to happen?

Audio stuttering should not be an issue with this hardware in these lightweight games. I am using the HDMI audio output of the GPU.
I have tried some fixes from some threads in Discord with no noticeable change:

Ensure I'm using a proper 4K 2.1 capable HDMI cable. I'm using this but I've tried a few: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B09MQLP33J
Rule out amplifier as the cause -- stutter occurs via directly connected TV speakers and via TC->optical link to amp
Force Gen4 PCIe in BIOS
Add PULSE_LATENCY_MSEC=50 in each game's startup args in Steam
Checked /sys/module/snd_hda_intel/parameters/power_save_controller and /sys/module/snd_hda_intel/parameters/power_save settings (N and 10 respectively). Setting to N and 0 didn't change anything.

Output of `rpm-ostree status`

root@gameboi:/home/rayray# rpm-ostree status
State: idle
Deployments:
● ostree-image-signed:docker://ghcr.io/ublue-os/bazzite-deck:latest
                   Digest: sha256:22d963175ca12c3f19e5b6997f2fb7a273dc3451076d3459f950e6e4b3d54561
                  Version: 39.20240302.0 (2024-03-03T02:14:15Z)
          LayeredPackages: fstrcmp libcec libmicrohttpd libnfs lirc-libs monitor-edid pcre-cpp perl-Switch shairplay-libs strace terminator
                           tinyxml x2goserver
                Initramfs: '-I /etc/crypttab /etc/modprobe.d/amdgpu.conf /etc/modprobe.d/deck-blacklist.conf' 

  ostree-image-signed:docker://ghcr.io/ublue-os/bazzite-deck:latest
                   Digest: sha256:22d963175ca12c3f19e5b6997f2fb7a273dc3451076d3459f950e6e4b3d54561
                  Version: 39.20240302.0 (2024-03-03T02:14:15Z)
          LayeredPackages: fstrcmp libmicrohttpd libnfs lirc-libs monitor-edid pcre-cpp perl-Switch shairplay-libs strace terminator tinyxml
                           x2goserver
                Initramfs: '-I /etc/crypttab /etc/modprobe.d/amdgpu.conf /etc/modprobe.d/deck-blacklist.conf'

Hardware

System is a custom HTPC running bazzite-deck:

CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 5600
RAM: F4-3200C16D-32GVK G.Skill Ripjaws 16GBx2
Motherboard: B550M PG Riptide
Storage: NVMe Intel 670p Series M.2 2280 2TB
GPU: Sapphire 11306-05-20G Pulse AMD Radeon RX 6700 XT OC
PCIe Bluetooth Adapter: AX1800 PCI-E WiFi Card MT7921 (wi-fi not in use, only for BT)
USB-C Network adapter (0bda:8156 Realtek Semiconductor Corp. USB 10/100/1G/2.5G LAN) to avoid issues with integrated NIC

Extra information or context

No response

Mar 05 '24 00:03 rayrayrayraydog

Update: I found another source online saying that AMD fTPM could be contributing to audio stutter. Tried disabling this with no change.

Mar 07 '24 00:03 rayrayrayraydog

Also having audio stuttering in the games I'm playing, Dark souls remastered and death stranding.

Bazzite install is fresh on an 3600x/7600xt system.

Mar 07 '24 17:03 AmazingMrBrock

I tried using a USB sound card instead of the GPU's HDMI audio, and with that there is no stuttering. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0B9H53KD9 So definitely something going on with the GPU / snd_hda_intel module. A solution that doesn't require additional hardware is ideal so I will keep testing this as the system receives updates.

Mar 11 '24 23:03 rayrayrayraydog

I have the same problem. With chimeraos, i dont have this issue.

Ryzen 7600 Rx 7800 xt

Mar 15 '24 15:03 Akruidenberg

I also have this issue under any load (games, compute) cpu: r5 3600 gpu: rx5700 ram: 32gb 3600mhz

Mar 16 '24 00:03 nayrxoc

Check if it is a scheduler bug sudo systemctl disable com.system76.Scheduler.service and reboot to reset everything the scheduler has done. if you still experience stuttering please re-enable the system76-scheduler again (swap out disable with enable --now)

no matter the result though, please report back here. Thanks

Mar 18 '24 12:03 HikariKnight

@HikariKnight did some testing, but the problem still exist. The same with system76 disabled.

Mar 18 '24 15:03 Akruidenberg

If you're using HDMI audio, this is unfortunately a known issue with one of the various HDR patches. I suspect this will be resolved shortly with the launch of Fedora 40 and kernel 6.8 and will update this issue as builds of that come online.

Mar 18 '24 15:03 KyleGospo

I do playing over hdmi, but not HDR. I have a hdr tv, but it will flickering when enabled.

Mar 18 '24 17:03 Akruidenberg

If you're using HDMI audio, this is unfortunately a known issue with one of the various HDR patches. I suspect this will be resolved shortly with the launch of Fedora 40 and kernel 6.8 and will update this issue as builds of that come online.

I don't play with HDR enabled. Should that matter?

Mar 18 '24 18:03 rayrayrayraydog

@HikariKnight did some testing, but the problem still exist. The same with system76 disabled.

thanks for testing, i have had some cases where the scheduler was causing some audio issues on my threadripper under some cpu loads so was worth checking :) Kyle already mentioned the cause though

Mar 18 '24 21:03 HikariKnight

hey just to check back in on this, I tried doing the system76 idea to no avail and looked around the internet for this issue in pipewire what fixed it for me was increasing default.clock.min-quantum in pipewire.conf from 64 to 1024 as described in this https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/pipewire/pipewire/-/wikis/Config-PipeWire#configuration-file-pipewireconf

don't know if this is the same reason as others, but in my instance this helped :3

Mar 23 '24 23:03 nayrxoc

default.clock.min-quantum

I've searched through all the pipewire.conf files I can find on my system ... they all seem to set this to 1024 already. Where did you update it exactly?

Mar 23 '24 23:03 rayrayrayraydog

default.clock.min-quantum

I've searched through all the pipewire.conf files I can find on my system ... they all seem to set this to 1024 already. Where did you update it exactly?

the link I sent has instructions for where it is "The PipeWire configuration template file is located in /usr/share/pipewire/pipewire.conf. You can copy and edit the file to /etc/pipewire/ or ~/.config/pipewire/pipewire.conf" That file won't exist so you will have to make it, for me I even had to make /.config/pipewire itself

if its already 1024 for you, it may be a separate issue then though

Mar 24 '24 00:03 nayrxoc

Strange enough, i have also stutters when using a bluetooth headphone.

Mar 24 '24 16:03 Akruidenberg

If you could update and try again I would appreciate it. May be fixed in the latest build.

Mar 24 '24 16:03 KyleGospo

If you could update and try again I would appreciate it. May be fixed in the latest build.

Just gave it a whirl. There is a definite improvement now, but the issue is still there. In What the Golf the stuttering is much less frequent, enough that I had to play for a few minutes to hear it happen two or three times. In PowerWash Simulator though it still happens pretty frequently, especially when holding down the trigger and getting a lot of noise from the sprayer.

I had also tried the pipewire.conf changes earlier (copied /usr/share/pipewire/pipewire.conf to /etc/pipewire/pipewire.conf|~/.config/pipewire/pipewire.conf, and set default.clock.min-quantum on line 32 to 1024 and rebooted). I didn't notice any significant change with this one.

rayray@gameboi:~$ sudo rpm-ostree status
State: idle
Deployments:
● ostree-image-signed:docker://ghcr.io/ublue-os/bazzite-deck:latest
                   Digest: sha256:79d763a11d2c16957bfb18cc1129bc9ec62b23909ad37f42ce94996eeacb00e9
                  Version: 39.20240323.0 (2024-03-24T06:07:55Z)
          LayeredPackages: fstrcmp libcec libmicrohttpd libnfs lirc-libs monitor-edid pcre-cpp perl-Switch shairplay-libs strace terminator tinyxml x2goserver
                Initramfs: '-I /etc/crypttab /etc/modprobe.d/amdgpu.conf /etc/modprobe.d/deck-blacklist.conf' 

  ostree-image-signed:docker://ghcr.io/ublue-os/bazzite-deck:latest
                   Digest: sha256:79d763a11d2c16957bfb18cc1129bc9ec62b23909ad37f42ce94996eeacb00e9
                  Version: 39.20240323.0 (2024-03-24T06:07:55Z)
          LayeredPackages: fstrcmp libmicrohttpd libnfs lirc-libs monitor-edid pcre-cpp perl-Switch shairplay-libs strace terminator tinyxml x2goserver
                Initramfs: '-I /etc/crypttab /etc/modprobe.d/amdgpu.conf /etc/modprobe.d/deck-blacklist.conf' 

  ostree-image-signed:docker://ghcr.io/ublue-os/bazzite-deck:latest
                   Digest: sha256:0a2204f5a96e9eb14affec41d09cf6035777626d190bfaabb9de48c954aca0f5
                  Version: 39.20240311.0 (2024-03-12T08:05:37Z)
          LayeredPackages: fstrcmp libmicrohttpd libnfs lirc-libs monitor-edid pcre-cpp perl-Switch shairplay-libs strace terminator tinyxml x2goserver
                Initramfs: '-I /etc/crypttab /etc/modprobe.d/amdgpu.conf /etc/modprobe.d/deck-blacklist.conf' 
                   Pinned: yes

Mar 24 '24 17:03 rayrayrayraydog

Is this fixed with version 2.5.0?

Apr 15 '24 09:04 Akruidenberg

My machine pulled down a Fedora 40 image today so I tried this again, same result. There is still audio stuttering in the games I listed.

rayray@gameboi:~$ neofetch
                                            rayray@gameboi
     %%%%%%====%%%%%%%%%%                
   %%%%%%%%    %%%%%%%%%%%%%%             󱋩  bazzite-deck:main 
  %%%%%%%%%    %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%           󰣛  Fedora Linux 40 (Kinoite) x86_64
  %%%%%%%%%    %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%###           Linux 6.8.7-301.fsync.fc40.x86_64
  %%%%%%%%%    %%%%%%%%%%%%%######        󰅐  4 mins
  ==                  =======######      
  ==                  =========#####      󰾰  B550M PG Riptide
  %%%%%%%%%    %%%%%%%####======#####     󰻠  AMD Ryzen 5 5600 (12) @ 4.47 GHz
  %%%%%%%%%    %%%%%#######=====#####     󰍛  AMD Radeon RX 6700 XT
  %%%%%%%%%    %%%#########=====#####       4.31 GiB / 31.26 GiB (14%)
  %%%%%%%%%    %%##########=====#####       1.02 TiB / 1.86 TiB (55%) - btrfs [Read-only]
  %%%%%%%%%====###########=====######     󰍹  3840x2160 @ 60Hz [External]
   %%%%%%%%====#########======######      󰖺  ASRock LED Controller
    %%%%%%%=====#####========######      
     %%%%###===============#######          bash 5.2.26
      %#######==========#########           /dev/pts/0
        #######################           󰏖  2661 (rpm), 54 (flatpak-system), 24 (flatpak-user)
          ###################            
              ###########                  ● ● ● ● ● ● ● ● 
rayray@gameboi:~$ 
rayray@gameboi:~$ 
rayray@gameboi:~$ sudo rpm-ostree status
State: idle
Deployments:
● ostree-image-signed:docker://ghcr.io/ublue-os/bazzite-deck:latest
                   Digest: sha256:a08c542ed755d55ce02d062f7bc43e1cba6c7e44f16b6db05c67f2de63755af2
                  Version: main (2024-04-24T17:03:19Z)
          LayeredPackages: fstrcmp libmicrohttpd monitor-edid pcre-cpp perl-Switch shairplay-libs strace terminator tinyxml x2goserver
                Initramfs: '-I /etc/crypttab /etc/modprobe.d/amdgpu.conf /etc/modprobe.d/deck-blacklist.conf' 

  ostree-image-signed:docker://ghcr.io/ublue-os/bazzite-deck:latest
                   Digest: sha256:f87d5dd11724f35cf8f47a1d22e38777d22160412737ad8d8a288fe23758eb1d
                  Version: 39.20240419.0 (2024-04-19T17:09:55Z)
          LayeredPackages: fstrcmp libcec libmicrohttpd libnfs lirc-libs monitor-edid pcre-cpp perl-Switch shairplay-libs strace terminator tinyxml
                           x2goserver
                Initramfs: '-I /etc/crypttab /etc/modprobe.d/amdgpu.conf /etc/modprobe.d/deck-blacklist.conf' 

  ostree-image-signed:docker://ghcr.io/ublue-os/bazzite-deck:latest
                   Digest: sha256:0a2204f5a96e9eb14affec41d09cf6035777626d190bfaabb9de48c954aca0f5
                  Version: 39.20240311.0 (2024-03-12T08:05:37Z)
          LayeredPackages: fstrcmp libmicrohttpd libnfs lirc-libs monitor-edid pcre-cpp perl-Switch shairplay-libs strace terminator tinyxml
                           x2goserver
                Initramfs: '-I /etc/crypttab /etc/modprobe.d/amdgpu.conf /etc/modprobe.d/deck-blacklist.conf' 
                   Pinned: yes
rayray@gameboi:~$ uname -a
Linux gameboi 6.8.7-301.fsync.fc40.x86_64 #1 SMP PREEMPT_DYNAMIC Tue Apr 23 17:32:01 UTC 2024 x86_64 GNU/Linux

Apr 24 '24 20:04 rayrayrayraydog

@rayrayrayraydog Thanks. I will stay with chimeraos.

Apr 25 '24 12:04 Akruidenberg

It would be great to hear from any other users that had the issue as well. It's possible that I've modified something, somewhere that is allowing this to continue happening and I've also layered several packages. I may try reinstalling from scratch to see if it continues with a fresh system.

Apr 25 '24 22:04 rayrayrayraydog

I have the same issue with Red Dead Redemption 2. I also ended up using an USB soundcard (Creative sound blaster HD) which is a great workaround. I used the motherboards audio directly which also produced crackling, and my airpods pro never crackle but skips as you described. However I only tried out this game and Tomb Romb Raider 2013. TR did not have any issues but I played only 30 minutes with that. I'll try more and come back with more infos.

RDR2 also tends to stutter and crackle on Windows too.

My other issue with 6700XT is Blender not showing up HIP rendering. If you've got some time @rayrayrayraydog can you please try it out? Probably we have similar systems.

Apr 29 '24 15:04 adms-hu

Tried again with today's update in Power Wash Simulator. No change yet.

rayray@gameboi:~$ rpm-ostree status
State: idle
Deployments:
● ostree-image-signed:docker://ghcr.io/ublue-os/bazzite-deck:latest
                   Digest: sha256:c375c636bb771c9978170087e2e0b1731ac7748ea0f34a84a42ba37b1386abfc
                  Version: 40.20240501.0 (2024-05-02T07:13:49Z)
          LayeredPackages: fstrcmp libcec libmicrohttpd monitor-edid pcre-cpp perl-Switch shairplay-libs strace terminator tinyxml x2goserver
                Initramfs: '-I /etc/crypttab /etc/modprobe.d/amdgpu.conf /etc/modprobe.d/deck-blacklist.conf' 

  ostree-image-signed:docker://ghcr.io/ublue-os/bazzite-deck:latest
                   Digest: sha256:c375c636bb771c9978170087e2e0b1731ac7748ea0f34a84a42ba37b1386abfc
                  Version: 40.20240501.0 (2024-05-02T07:13:49Z)
          LayeredPackages: fstrcmp libmicrohttpd monitor-edid pcre-cpp perl-Switch shairplay-libs strace terminator tinyxml x2goserver
                Initramfs: '-I /etc/crypttab /etc/modprobe.d/amdgpu.conf /etc/modprobe.d/deck-blacklist.conf' 

  ostree-image-signed:docker://ghcr.io/ublue-os/bazzite-deck:latest
                   Digest: sha256:0a2204f5a96e9eb14affec41d09cf6035777626d190bfaabb9de48c954aca0f5
                  Version: 39.20240311.0 (2024-03-12T08:05:37Z)
          LayeredPackages: fstrcmp libmicrohttpd libnfs lirc-libs monitor-edid pcre-cpp perl-Switch shairplay-libs strace terminator tinyxml x2goserver
                Initramfs: '-I /etc/crypttab /etc/modprobe.d/amdgpu.conf /etc/modprobe.d/deck-blacklist.conf' 
                   Pinned: yes

May 03 '24 02:05 rayrayrayraydog

Since I had issues with HIP rendering too so I tried out ChimeraOS as an alternative. No crackling at all. Bazzite have much more goodies pre-installed I assume one of those causing this. I don't even have Decky now, but I plan to install that later. Does HIP work for you?

May 03 '24 18:05 adms-hu

Wanna report the same thing with a RX6600, happened with:

What the Golf
Rogue Legacy 2

@KyleGospo

If you're using HDMI audio, this is unfortunately a known issue with one of the various HDR patches. I suspect this will be resolved shortly with the launch of Fedora 40 and kernel 6.8 and will update this issue as builds of that come online.

Can you link the root issue bug/discussion for this?

Edit: And yes, this seems to be the issue for me with the HDMI audio driver. Put a Fiio E10k USB DAC between my box and the receiver: No audio problems

May 03 '24 19:05 lukasgierth

Here to report the same thing happening with a Ryzen 5 3600 and RX5700XT. In ChimeraOS this was never an issue. Every game I've played I've noticed this in: see S31bz on Steam for examples

May 14 '24 21:05 al12gamer

Hmm Diablo IV and Risk of Rain Returns seem to suffer less

May 14 '24 22:05 al12gamer

Update here. Diablo IV only has crackling every so often, but Rocket League, Risk of Rain Returns, Fall Guys (proton ge) and the various other games I tend to play with friends from time to time seem to still be suffering crackling. When the Diablo IV crackling happens, sometimes the audio to the sound bar will just completely stop for a few seconds and then come back. Matt H mentioned here that I should grab more logs for this, so I will the next time I run my Steam Machine that previously worked flawlessly with ChimeraOS. Anything I should look out for in the logs, specifically? @KyleGospo

May 20 '24 21:05 al12gamer

I have this issue too using a 6750xt, with hdmi out to my 4KTV in game mode.

Hi-Fi Rush has skipping audio, it really kills the fun. Haven't tried desktop, or my monitor, or other audio outputs, or many other games yet. Will investigate when I have time.

Edit:

Yeah, it only happens on TV with hdmi audio. In many games. Switching audio stops the stuttering.

May 29 '24 12:05 jonnypanic

Would just like to note this is still happening both on a GPD Win Mini 7840U running Bazzite as well as the following living room "Steam Machine" outputting audio over HDMI from a 5700XT: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/2x28hk

Jun 18 '24 18:06 al12gamer

bazzite bazzite copied to clipboard

Audio stuttering in many games in Gamescope w/ 6700XT

Describe the bug

What did you expect to happen?

Output of rpm-ostree status

Hardware

Extra information or context

bazzite
bazzite copied to clipboard

Output of `rpm-ostree status`