Crackling issue with Mavericks / Ableton

I've been having a pretty irritating issue for months now which seems to be exclusive to my Focusrite 2i4 & Ableton 9.1 (also 9.1.2) on Mavericks where I get this wave of bizarre crackling/static sounds every 5 - 8 minutes or so. It happens when playing through my interface, so mic or guitar/bass signals and it does seem to be exclusive to Ableton, I opened Logic Pro and played for a while through the 2i4 without issue. I have tried literally EVERYTHING I can think of, including sending my interface in for repair - which apparently was not the issue (they still swapped the board for me just to be safe.)

The only thing i've ever come across is the "class compliant mode" fix on the focusrite website, I installed and ran that app - it asked me to unplug the scarlett, and restart, which I did - but this problem still persists. Is there some other confirmation I should be getting that it's officially in class compliant mode?

These are a few samples from when the static has occurred in my recordings (these were the only items in the file at that time, so it was not CPU overload as it was at 4%) Here & Here

I have of course adjusted buffer, latency settings ranging from 64, up to 1024. Also plugged directly into my macbook, tried plugging in through a powered USB hub, tried removing every other peripheral from my mac so it was just the interface and my mac, turned off wifi and bluetooth.

My system is a very capable Retina Macbook 15" 2.7Ghz i7, 16GB ram, Mavericks, and is not experiencing any CPU overload.

Please note this does NOT occur with my older M-audio USB interface in any software... only my 2i4. Any help is greatly appreciated, am hoping maybe a more technically inclined forum may have different suggestions..

wesk702 said:

Give 9.1.4 a try.
Also I believe focusrite has an update for osx a little while back. See if that helps first.

Click to expand...

Will try out 9.1.4, not sure how major of an update that one is but there was no change when upgraded to 9.1.2.

Also as for the Focusrite update I think that was the 'class compliant mode' fix that they suggested, which I did try, but also did not work.

Thanks!

wesk702 said:

Is the crackling at the same intervals?
Any nonlegit plugins?

Click to expand...

Actually for a while it had been coming in waves of 5 minutes, this was before I sent my interface in for repair, i had a timer running and basically at the 5 minute mark those flares would start. It has since become less consistent, but does happen somewhere between 5 - 7 minutes it seems like. When there was a predictable wave I was trying to search for any system processes which might trigger at 5 minutes (thinking mail or something) and could not come up with anything.

Interesting. I don't think I have any non legit plugins, I have some free VST's (effects, compressors) but most of the VST's I have came bundled with pieces of hardware. However I may have uninstalled some plugins incorrectly or something, would Ableton be scanning those folders once a session has been started? I do know on the examples I posted that no plugins were applied to them, they were just a raw recording at that time.

wesk702 said:

Have you tried bouncing a project that crackles, then loading that bounce into logic? Or if even seeing if the aiff/wave crackles when ableton is shut down?

Click to expand...

Just upgraded to 9.1.4, the problem is still occurring. The Aiff does still crackle with Ableton closed, or if played through other software. The crackling does not occur when just listening in Ableton (unless it had recorded audibly into a track permanently), or with any type of Midi recording, just when playing or recording a live mic/instrument into Ableton..

wesk702 said:

Have you tried this?

1. Unplug the Scarlett from the usb port
2. go to Mac HD > System > Library > Extensions and delete FocusriteUsb2Audio.kext
3. Empty your trash can
4. Shut down your computer
5. Plug in the Scarlett
6. Boot your computer

Click to expand...

Will try this as soon as I'm home from work today, this is the type of step I was hoping I'd get on the tech forums as I didn't know where to venture in the system for these filetypes. Thanks! Will let you know if this repairs anything...

wesk702 said:

Have you tried this?

1. Unplug the Scarlett from the usb port
2. go to Mac HD > System > Library > Extensions and delete FocusriteUsb2Audio.kext
3. Empty your trash can
4. Shut down your computer
5. Plug in the Scarlett
6. Boot your computer

Click to expand...

Tried it, no such luck. I actually didn't have that driver extension in there (I'm guessing when I tried their suggested Class Compliant mode fix it removed that exact file). I found a Novation Audio driver extension in their, Novation is their parent company, and removed that just to try it out, and after the system was rebooted the static flair still occurred.

Given that this has been happening for months I think i've just resigned myself to purchasing another interface from another company at this point - even though I know this interface works with other software. If you have any other thoughts before the weekend please feel free to let me know, otherwise i'll just try a new unit.

Thanks so much for your help so far, I really appreciate that!

wesk702 said:

Shoot man, I don't know. Did you try other forums?
/r/audioengineering has some wizards in there that may help.

Click to expand...

Hey, yeah I had actually tried in there recently as well as a few other audio related subreddits, but it always kind of reached the same perplexing point. I ended up buying the new interface this weekend, and it is working fine. It's unfortunate I couldn't figure out what this conflict was with Ableton but at least this was some form of solution..

Thanks again!