Lag in audio file playback

Anki Help
1

Hi all,

I got a new computer, and everything has been going fine except for one problem with Anki. I have cards with multiple audio files, and on my old computer and on Ankidroid the card review process looks like this:

  • Hit “show card”
  • Audio 1 plays
  • Audio 2 plays
  • Audio 3 plays

Now, with my new computer, the process looks like this:

  • Hit “show card”
  • one second pause
  • Audio 1 plays
  • one second pause
  • Audio 2 plays
  • one second pause
  • Audio 3 plays

The delay is just long enough to be annoying. I’ve done some Googling, but haven’t been able to figure out the problem. I thought it might be a processor issue but my new computer should be faster than my phone and old computer. If I manually hit the audio buttons (the little play arrows) there is still a delay. Audio is fine in all other programs. Also important to note is that sometimes for maybe 30-50 reviews the pause disappears and things go back to normal. However, it always comes back. I haven’t been able to figure out a pattern to this.

The new laptop is a Dell XPS 13, if that helps at all. I’m running Anki 2.1.26.

Any help would be appreciated. Thank you!

1 Like
2

If you’re feeling adventurous, you may want to try the latest alpha, which has switched to a different audio player: https://betas.ankiweb.net/#/

3

Hi Damien,

Thanks for the suggestion. I just switched over to the latest alpha (build f44597bb) but it doesn’t seem to have made a difference. Any other thoughts? I just double checked AnkiDroid and the audio playback is still fine there. I’m having a hard time figuring out what the issue could be…

4

Update: I switched from the RealTek drivers included with the XPS 13 to Microsoft written drivers (as described in this website: https://neosmart.net/wiki/fix-realtek-audio-delay-lag/). And I think it fixed the problem! Sorry for bothering you with this, it turns out it was a problem with my computer rather than Anki. I’ll mark the topic as solved.

One question if you don’t mind: Do you have any idea when the new audio player will come to the stable release?

Thank you.

3 Likes