Motherboard Combo Exchange

TopMat

Hello, I've been having issues with my motherboard (Asus z690 TUF Gaming WiFi D4) that makes using it a pain. Audio crackles and pops when the volume changes, on windows notifications, on boot up, and watching videos. I've reached out to Asus for support multiple times and they only give inane troubleshooting tips/steps that anyone with a semblance of computer knowledge could think of. "Have you updated your drivers? Have you uninstalled and reinstalled them? Have you tried different ports?" I updated everything there is, latest bios, audio drivers, etc. I even reinstalled windows after exchanging the previous motherboard with the exact same issue. I even bought a USB DAC and the issue persists.

The question is, what other options do I have in motherboard exchanging? This is ridiculous that two motherboard have the exact same issue and I've eliminated as many other possibilities I can. I've changed drivers between Realtek and windows generic, tried a different motherboard of the same model, switched GPUs from 1080 ti to 3070, changed ram (while turning on and off XMP), turned off USB ports, turned off fast boot and hibernation. The PSU can't be the issue as that worked in the previous build. The only thing left to change is the CPU, and I don't see how that could be the issue, but I'm at my wits end.

PowerSpec_KenJ

Audio crackling can be caused by a grounding problem. If your outlet ground is good, then your power supply may have a bad ground, which may not have manifested in your old system. I recently fixed this same issue on a similar situation: old PSU, new system, audio crackling. Replacing the PSU fixed it.

TopMat

https://community.microcenter.com/discussion/comment/48040#Comment_48040

Can you elaborate on a bad ground? From my basic knowledge, a bad ground would cause much bigger issues than audio popping, such as shocking from even touching my PC.

TopMat

https://community.microcenter.com/discussion/comment/48040#Comment_48040

This did not solve my issue.