Z170Z Gaming 7 Audio Problem

[devinmosher]

At least ASUS is taking care of it and found a fix.

Dunno about a definitive fix but yes, there's no doubt Asus put its hand on consciousness and is trying to give support to solve the issue, while Gigabyte didn't spend even a word and is not updating its audio drivers (the last ones are Windows 7/8 drivers, rebranded to work under 10, but they weren't built from scratch for the new OS).

Anyways, the reason I sold Gigabyte board and got ASUS instead was not only because of sound. There were a lot more issues and features that did not work properly and I had the board long enough to try resolve them. However, shouldn't it be like that I buy a brand new board and I use it without any problems?
Btw, it's been over a month now since I got ASUS and still no problems and everything works perfect. To be more precise got the board on March 28, 2016.

I will definitely be going back to ASUS after this board. First gigabyte board and i honestly dont care what reputation they have....this was a bad enough first impression to steer me away from ever getting another gigabyte board. I can honestly say that I have never had an issue with an ASUS board to date. Lucky? Maybe....but good enough for me to continue buying their boards.
Needless to say, it's pretty sad that gigabytes last driver release for this board was nearly 4 months ago and with no support in sight from Creative, I am hard pressed to buy any of thier products again as well. Its quite sad to say the least that when they put out such a horrible product they dont even try to fix it.

[Leppermessiah]

Has anyone tried replacing the op-amp?  Seems like an inexpensive and easy solution if it works.

[kangoo]

in case anyone still has this problem it would be good to check with the latest bios, the most updated list is usually at tt forums or at giga website (F8l is the latest one)

has anyone tried to speak with giga support directly? they have some kind of ticket system at their site too

[SoundBlaster Problems]

Ok, I built this system less than a week ago using the Gaming 7 motherboard.  The first day I noticed the audio was really LOUD.  Like I would have to set the volume to 10% for it to be at a normal sounding level.  I chalked it up to the fact that I hadn't yet messed around with Creative's software (the mixer, EQ, etc.) and didn't think much of it at the time.

Then last night I was playing a game and suddenly I heard this weird distorted screeching sound mixed with everything sounding like it was underwater.  A reboot fixed it but only temporarily.   Later on I went to Youtube to listen to some music and noticed that the volume was really low.  I messed around with all the mixers and EQ in the Creative suite but that didn't fix it.  I wasn't getting any screeching, but the treble sounded really flushed out and the vocals were really low.  It is nothing like my old system where everything sounded correct.  My last board was a Gigabyte board that I bought in 2010 and its audio was far superior (Realtek chipset I think).  That's pretty sad.

I figured I had a bad board and was getting ready to RMA it, but I found this thread through a google search.  I am glad I am not alone.  The bottom line is that I am not having just one problem, but am having multiple issues with the audio:

1) The screeching sound that someone posted a sample of -- that is EXACTLY what I am getting.
2) Weird volume levels randomly (either too loud or too quiet).
3) Terrible sounding treble and high notes.  (Bass seems OK).
4) An underwater type of muffling to the audio at times.

All of these don't happen at once.  It's usually just one at a time.  Rebooting might fix it for a while but it always comes back.  I really want this crap fixed.  If it were a minor problem (like something wrong with a PCI slot) I could live with it.  But when it's audio, I can't live with that.  I have to have audio on a board that I payed $200 for.

I should have known better than to buy a board with Creative audio.  Creative is a company that most real audiophiles cannot stand.  Go to any audiophile internet forum and tell them you use a creative chipset or soundcard and they will laugh.

[michaeldowns]

Bump!

On my Gigabyte GA-Z170X Gaming 7 - BIOS F8l system, there is a constant high frequency background hiss. It is a low volume but clearly audible hiss. I don't perceive it as a hum, or AC mains issue.

It seems to be some kind of RFI unrelated to a 50/60 hz hum.

The onboard audio subsystem for this board is an advertised feature and should be shielded against RFI, but apparently it is not done well enough.

 I came across this thread also searching for a solution.

 **** Just to be clear, as of today: ALL DRIVERS, APPS and BIOS ARE THE MOST CURRENT VERSION ****


 ********************************
 CPU - Intel I7-6700K - OC to 4.5 GHz
 Motherboard - Gigabyte GA-Z170X Gaming 7 - BIOS F8l
 Memory - G.SKILL Ripjaws V Series 32GB (2 x 16GB) DDR4 3200 (PC4 25600) (F4-3200C14D-32GVK)
 Graphics - Gigabyte GeForce GTX 970 G1 Gaming 4GB GDDR5 Pcie
 O/S SSD - Samsung 950 PRO Series 256GB PCIe NVMe M.2
 Data HDD - Seagate 4TB SSHD (Solid State Hybrid Drive) SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache (ST4000DX001)
 ODD - Pioneer Blu-Ray Writer (BDR-2209)
 Liquid Cooler - Enermax Liqmax II 240 (ELC-LMR240-BS)
 Thermal Compound - Cooler Master ThermalFusion 400 High Performance (4G RG-TF4-TGU1-GP)
 PSU - CORSAIR HXi HX1000i 1000W Platinum Certified, Full Modular (CP-9020074-NA)
 Chassis - Cooler Master Silencio 652S - Silent Mid Tower (SIL-652-KKN2)
 O/S - Win10 Pro x64
 ********************************

[jcgo16]

i rma my motherboard, same issue @michaeldowns,

so much hissing, i did find out if you remove your gpu it no more hiss, but there is a popping sound on the audio

that's what i found out, i think there's a problem with the audio and the motherboard itself

[sygnus21]

Don't really have anything, but I have both a Z87 (G1 Sniper 5) and this Z170X (GA-Z170X Gaming GT) and noticed both boards are being reported as having issues with the built in audio system. This is a shame because this is also one of the great selling points of the board(s). Seems Gigabyte need to take a hard look at their implementation here.

Anyway for me I never bought either of these boards for their built in audio and only use my dedicated SoundBlaster ZxR card. No problems there. I guess my point is I still don't trust built in audio solutions regardless of who makes or implements them.

At any rate sorry to hear you guys/gals are having such issues here. Hope it gets resolved. I for one won't be messing with the onboard soundcard of the Gaming GT.

Peace 

[SoundBlaster Problems]

So, here I am two weeks after my post above.  The audio issues were non-existent for several days and then just now I was playing Overwatch and suddenly the awful screeching and underwater distortion came back in full force randomly.  The only thing I can do is restart my PC which will "fix it" for a while (until it comes back).

What should I do?  Contact the seller?  Contact Gigabyte for an RMA?  I really don't want to be without my board for several weeks.

[sygnus21]

Sad to say but if you want quicker answers and responses you might try the other Gigabyte forums here: Gigabyte Z170 \ H170 \ B150 Discussion, Help and Owners Club. Unfortunately this forum doesn't seem to be very active, and questions\comments can go unanswered for days, if ever 
 
 

[SoundBlaster Problems]

Sad to say but if you want quicker answers and responses you might try the other Gigabyte forums here: Gigabyte Z170 \ H170 \ B150 Discussion, Help and Owners Club. Unfortunately this forum doesn't seem to be very active, and questions\comments can go unanswered for days, if ever 
 
 

Link doesn't work.

[Leppermessiah]

Sad to say but if you want quicker answers and responses you might try the other Gigabyte forums here: Gigabyte Z170 \ H170 \ B150 Discussion, Help and Owners Club. Unfortunately this forum doesn't seem to be very active, and questions\comments can go unanswered for days, if ever 
 
 

Link doesn't work.

http://www.overclock.net/t/1571741/gigabyte-z170-h170-b150-discussion-help-and-owners-club-ultra-durable-and-gaming-editions

[SoundBlaster Problems]

Sad to say but if you want quicker answers and responses you might try the other Gigabyte forums here: Gigabyte Z170 \ H170 \ B150 Discussion, Help and Owners Club. Unfortunately this forum doesn't seem to be very active, and questions\comments can go unanswered for days, if ever 
 
 

Link doesn't work.

http://www.overclock.net/t/1571741/gigabyte-z170-h170-b150-discussion-help-and-owners-club-ultra-durable-and-gaming-editions

Thanks.  I've posted over at OCN for years and have already been in that thread.

I called Gigabyte tech support and the guy told me to try and reseat the amplifier.  He doesn't think it's a driver issue but probably something causing "interference" on the hardware itself.  A loose amp, he reckons, could be the culprit.  Makes sense, but I am doubting it.  Has anyone else tried this or tried replacing the amp with any success?

[sygnus21]

Sad to say but if you want quicker answers and responses you might try the other Gigabyte forums here: Gigabyte Z170 \ H170 \ B150 Discussion, Help and Owners Club. Unfortunately this forum doesn't seem to be very active, and questions\comments can go unanswered for days, if ever 
 
 

Link doesn't work.

Sorry about that, don't know what happened but I see someone else posted the workable link. Good luck.

[ZedZedski]

So, it's been over 2 month since I got rid of Gigabyte Z170X Gaming 7 motherboard and went with ASUS Maximus Viii Hero. So far I had not a single problem with ASUS and everything works flawless, including BIOS, which is a paradise compared to Gigabyte's garbage BIOS.
As I said before, I will never buy any Gigabyte products since Gigabyte don't care about their customers. I will be selling my Gigabyte G1 GTX 970 and buying ASUS ROG Strix 1080.
This was last time I bought anything from Gigabyte. Thanks for none careless customer support, Gigabyte!

[legal]

So, it's been over 2 month since I got rid of Gigabyte Z170X Gaming 7 motherboard and went with ASUS Maximus Viii Hero. So far I had not a single problem with ASUS and everything works flawless, including BIOS, which is a paradise compared to Gigabyte's garbage BIOS.
As I said before, I will never buy any Gigabyte products since Gigabyte don't care about their customers. I will be selling my Gigabyte G1 GTX 970 and buying ASUS ROG Strix 1080.
This was last time I bought anything from Gigabyte. Thanks for none careless customer support, Gigabyte!

A pity that in Brazil a mother board costs so expensive, I'm stuck with this card to my next upgrade and this was the worst I ever bought in my life, working with computers for 20 years, this board reminds me of the old PC chips so unstable and poor support. Audio onboard with wheezing is an unforgivable failure in a $ 200 card, problems with instabilities, slow boot-enabled xmp profile, windows need to be reinstalled every month since corrupts anything, it's a joke. Worst of all, lose hope, because already in the market for 10 months and has not a single bios to function properly so far.