[Solved] Sound has popping

Question

At this point my ultimate arch setup is nearly complete and Im trying to refine it.
My issue is thus: sound works fine as long as there's an application running that is using it. But when there is no application using sound, a faint but extremely annoying high pitched sound sometimes plays. As I use headphones exclusivly, even if I dont notice the high pitched whine it eventually causes headaches.
When an application that uses sound is started - or closed - a slight but very audible popping occurs; as if its "switching" between something.
Im not sure what to post to aid in the diagnoses of this issue so Ill guess.
My laptop is a System76 Galago UltraPro with intel sound.
I've used both Ubuntu and OpenSUSE and neither had any sound issue at all.
I have alsa, pulseaudio, and jack installed
This issue may sound trivial - but it is extremely annoying/potentially painful as I do alot of reading on my PC.
Thank You.
EDIT: There is a slight popping at login as well.
SOLVED EDIT: TLP was the problem. It turns the audio chip and controller off after a timeout of 1 second by default. The minute power savings from which is not worth the audio issues to me.
TLP stores all configuration in /etc/default/tlp
Change: SOUND_POWER_SAVE=1
to           SOUND_POWER_SAVE=0
0 disables timeout
I also set  SOUND_POWER_SAVE_CONTROLLER=Y
to             SOUND_POWER_SAVE_CONTROLLER=N
Which disables power saving on the audio controller.
Last edited by fait (2014-01-30 01:27:52)

Answer 1

The first time any app that uses audio starts up or after the last app using audio is closed there is a brief popping.
When the user logs in there is a brief popping.
When there are no applications using the audio there may be a high pitched whine sometimes, but not always.