I used to experience a popping noise when putting on some music, starting a video, etc. As this was just mildly annoying, it took some time before I bothered checking out how to fix it.

Turns out the problem was a common one amongst users with an Intel HDA audio based device. Good thing the fix (workaround) was an easy one! First open a terminal to confirm you have Intel HDA. Check what this returns:

aplay -l

If it returns something with Intel HDA, then your problem might as well be solved by this workaround. What we are gonna do is edit the configuration file for alsa. (Note: If you suddenly think “wait, I use PulseAudio, not alsa”, then do not worry, PulseAudio uses alsa). Open the following file as root with your favourite text editor.

/etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base.conf

If you are unsure how to do this, then press ALT+F2 and issue the following command:

gksudo gedit /etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base.conf

and comment out (this is done by putting a # at the beginning of the line) the line starting with

options snd-hda-intel power_save

Now save the file, go back to your terminal and type in

sudo alsa force-reload

to ensure the configuration file gets loaded in. (Alternatively, you can restart your computer)

More information can be found at: