Hi Dr Eden ... and welcome to the forums ...
On the hardware side of life:
Diagnostics - It is always a good idea when facing unexplained system behavior to run diagnostics first, before moving on software solutions (since software cannot fix broken hardware).
_______________
On the software side of life:
Was everything running OK, while running Windows 10, until just the last few days? Or?
If everything was OK until just a few days ago, you can try using System Restore to revert back to the system state of the restore point:
System Restore in Windows 10
1)
Right-click the
Windows Start Menu icon
2) Select
System
3) Select
System Protection (a blue link in the upper left-hand corner)
4) Select
System Restore
5)
Choose a restore point from
before the current trouble started.
_______________
If, on the other hand, everything was running OK using an earlier version of Windows (7, 8, 8.1) and just recently you upgraded to Windows 10 & the audio troubles began -- you have the option to revert to your previous version with just a few clicks (if it has been less than 30 days since you upgraded)
Go Back to Previous Version of Windows
1)
Click on the
Windows Start Menu icon
2) Select
Settings
3) Select
Update and security
4) Select
Recovery
5) Select
Go Back to Windows 7 (or 8, or 8.1)
This can take some time, it varies quite a lot from machine to machine. For systems with older hardware, there often just aren't Windows 10 drivers mature enough yet (and some that simply are not available, and might never be).
_______________
You mention noticing the network issue. One thing you could try right away is to
remove the TP-Link adapter, and try a Windows 10 compatible one (you could borrow one for testing purposes). When I looked on the TP-Link support webpage for your adapter, the most recent version of Windows supported for that adapter was Windows Vista. Not a great sign for its performance in Windows 10.
_______________
A list .....
And - apologies for the cut-and-paste, but the audio issues in Windows 10 have proven to have a myriad of possible contributing factors: hence, here is a cut-and-past of a list I've been compiling for audio/video issues in Windows 10:
Some things to try for limiting audio/video glitches due to high latency, interrupt, and hard pagefault counts:
SSDs (for systems with an SSD along with a "spinning" HDD or two)
Since SSDs are dropping in price and growing in size, lately I've been recommending that the worst-offending audio-pop suffering programs/games be installed onto an SSD. Windows doesn't take up all that much room, and neither do a few games (you can still keep "saved games" and other non-demanding software installed to a larger "spinning" hard drive, along with your photo, music, and video collections).
SATA ports (this tip applies to desktops)
Some users who haven't seen any improvement by means of updating drivers have had success by altering their SATA port usage. A recent thread here concerns a system where the audio stuttering was helped by unplugging a DVD SATA drive (...and our tech Cluberti was nice enough to help explain why) ... The last few posts are where you will see mention of the SATA ports (and the nature of USB polling & the effect on latencies) .... Here's a link to that thread:
https://www.sysnative.com/forums/wi...efaults-fresh-install-usbport-sys-others.html
Hard Pagefaults
For high hard pagefaults, it can help to:
1) Limit startup processes that you don't need
2) Limit Windows-Updates file-sharing (in Settings > Updates and security > Windows Update > Advanced Options > Choose how updates are delivered > turn off "updates from more than one place" - that will limit unnecessary background network activity)
3) Limit the amount of "telemetry" (data sent to Microsoft ... choose the "Basic" option in Settings > Privacy > Feedback & Diagnostics ... and you can try "Never" as your "Feedback Frequency" while testing your latency issues)
4) Limit any Notifications that you don't need or want (Settings > System > Notifications & actions ... (for example, you don't need "Show me tips about Windows", nor many other notifications)
5) Turn off "Live" tiles on your Start Menu (to limit unnecessary background updating of any information you don't want or need)
6) Uninstall any Windows "Universal" apps that you don't want or need (Settings > System > Apps & features -- click the app you wish to uninstall) ... and for those that you don't want, but can't uninstall (some of the built-in apps) - you can still keep them from starting unwanted services (in Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Services) or startup modules (in Task Manager > Startup tab)
7) Visit the Windows Store, and make sure that all your "Universal" apps are up-to-date (updating in the background can cause high memory usage and generate hard pagefaults)
8) Test using a large set Virtual Memory range (see the "Virtual Memory" item below)
9) Background Tasks: Background activity can cause high pagefault counts - see if you can have a look during those times that your system is experiencing the audio/video stuttering ... In Task Manager, System Monitor, Process Explorer, Process Monitor (whichever tool you are most comfortable with) and see if anything pops out as a high-resource hog. Updates (windows, java, apple, vendor updates [PC vendor updaters, printer vendor updaters, etc]), messaging, VOIP (skype, etc.), Windows Media Player Network sharing service, Indexing (check Indexing Optons in Control Panel), Superfetch, Windows Search, etc ..... (even the Photos apps in Win10, which tends to want to search your photo collection from time to time -- something to do with "albums")... Basically, look at anything using an unhappily large amount of resources. Many such processes you might not need at all. And for some, you can limit their activities (or simply suspend them during high usage times).
Drivers
Nvidia: Especially for those with Nvidia video cards: try downloading and installing the latest driver. Install it using the "custom" option, and the "clean install" option. You can also see if you want or need all of the background Nvidia services that come with the latest drivers, many as part of the "Nvidia GeForce Experience" - which you can choose to install or not when you choose the "custom" install method. Here's a guide that has some details on the background services installed along with the Nvidia drivers, it might help you decide if you can do without some of them:
Disable NVIDIA Streamer Service and other NVIDIA processes - gHacks Tech News
ASMedia: For some systems, removing the ASMedia USB 3.1 driver and replacing it with a generic driver helps.
Antivirus
Some users find that certain modules of their antivirus program can have a rough affect on their audio quality. For some, it is especially noticeable when using the third-party firewall. You can try reverting to using just the Windows firewall, or to turn off a feature in the third-party firewall that blocks port scans (since most routers/modems/gateways have built-in port scanning blocking, it doesn't necessarily lower your defenses, since your hardware provides the service). In a recent thread here at SysNative, a system improved after uninstalling the premium (not-free) Avast Internet Security package, and installing a version of Kaspersky antivirus. I actually like Avast quite a lot ... I've used it for years with no problems - but I use the free version (which doesn't have the firewall).
Virtual Memory & a large set range
Since some computers experience the audio/video glitching during gaming, and Latency Monitor graphs often point to high hard pagefaults as a contributing factor (as in the pagefault tips above), I like to recommend testing things with the Virtual Memory settings for your computer manually set to a generous range (generally, with the lowest value the amount of your total installed physical system memory, and the highest value twice that number). This is an overly large range = but it can prove useful for testing. [after testing, the upper range could be lowered to one and a half times the physical memory total]... The reason for the large set range is that some games are infamous for memory leaks, and the large range might give you a better chance of surviving the memory trouble caused by the game with the memory leak.
_______________
Let us know if you have any questions
