I experience choppy media playback just like when one hits an old CD player while it's playing back a CD. The audio skips back maybe about 200-500ms. The frequency in where this behavior occurs is varying between a few seconds and a few minutes. I experience this behavior using sources like YouTube video playback in Firefox, VLC MP4 playback or mplayer WAV playback. Interestingly it doesn't occurs while playing back any media in the Vivaldi browser. It also occurs in Vivaldi but there was a 40 minutes phase where it doesn't occurs. What I also observed is that the CPU load slightly drops while the error occurs. I'm using the analog audio output of my main board. The playback on Windows using the same hardware works fine.
Here is some information about my setup. Since I initially asked this question I switched from Fedora to openSUSE but the problem persists. In my current and my previous setup I use KDE desktop, at the moment the latest stable version in the openSUSE repository 5.2. If you need additional information please leave a commend.
$ uname -a
Linux linux-mgzt 4.1.20-11-default #1 SMP PREEMPT Fri Mar 18 14:42:07 UTC 2016 (0a392b2) x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux
$ rpm -qa | grep alsa
alsa-1.0.29-10.1.x86_64
alsa-plugins-1.0.29-10.1.x86_64
alsa-plugins-pulse-1.0.29-10.1.x86_64
alsa-oss-1.0.28-5.2.x86_64
alsa-utils-1.0.29-9.1.x86_64
alsa-plugins-32bit-1.0.29-10.1.x86_64
alsa-oss-32bit-1.0.28-5.2.x86_64
alsa-plugins-pulse-32bit-1.0.29-10.1.x86_64
$ rpm -qa | grep pulse
pulseaudio-module-bluetooth-7.0-3.1.x86_64
pulseaudio-module-zeroconf-7.0-3.1.x86_64
alsa-plugins-pulse-1.0.29-10.1.x86_64
pulseaudio-utils-7.0-3.1.x86_64
pulseaudio-bash-completion-7.0-3.1.x86_64
pulseaudio-module-jack-7.0-3.1.x86_64
pulseaudio-module-lirc-7.0-3.1.x86_64
libpulse0-32bit-7.0-3.1.x86_64
libpulse0-7.0-3.1.x86_64
pulseaudio-module-x11-7.0-3.1.x86_64
pulseaudio-equalizer-2.7.0.2-3.1.noarch
libpulse-mainloop-glib0-7.0-3.1.x86_64
pulseaudio-7.0-3.1.x86_64
alsa-plugins-pulse-32bit-1.0.29-10.1.x86_64
pulseaudio-lang-7.0-3.1.noarch
$ cat /proc/cpuinfo
processor : 0
vendor_id : AuthenticAMD
cpu family : 16
model : 4
model name : AMD Phenom(tm) II X4 955 Processor
stepping : 2
microcode : 0x10000db
cpu MHz : 800.000
cache size : 512 KB
physical id : 0
siblings : 4
core id : 0
cpu cores : 4
apicid : 0
initial apicid : 0
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 5
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush mmx fxsr sse sse2 ht syscall nx mmxext fxsr_opt pdpe1gb rdtscp lm 3dnowext 3dnow constant_tsc rep_good nopl nonstop_tsc extd_apicid pni monitor cx16 popcnt lahf_lm cmp_legacy svm extapic cr8_legacy abm sse4a misalignsse 3dnowprefetch osvw ibs skinit wdt hw_pstate npt lbrv svm_lock nrip_save vmmcall
bugs : tlb_mmatch apic_c1e fxsave_leak sysret_ss_attrs
bogomips : 6443.01
TLB size : 1024 4K pages
clflush size : 64
cache_alignment : 64
address sizes : 48 bits physical, 48 bits virtual
power management: ts ttp tm stc 100mhzsteps hwpstate
processor : 1
vendor_id : AuthenticAMD
cpu family : 16
model : 4
model name : AMD Phenom(tm) II X4 955 Processor
stepping : 2
microcode : 0x10000db
cpu MHz : 800.000
cache size : 512 KB
physical id : 0
siblings : 4
core id : 1
cpu cores : 4
apicid : 1
initial apicid : 1
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 5
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush mmx fxsr sse sse2 ht syscall nx mmxext fxsr_opt pdpe1gb rdtscp lm 3dnowext 3dnow constant_tsc rep_good nopl nonstop_tsc extd_apicid pni monitor cx16 popcnt lahf_lm cmp_legacy svm extapic cr8_legacy abm sse4a misalignsse 3dnowprefetch osvw ibs skinit wdt hw_pstate npt lbrv svm_lock nrip_save vmmcall
bugs : tlb_mmatch apic_c1e fxsave_leak sysret_ss_attrs
bogomips : 6443.01
TLB size : 1024 4K pages
clflush size : 64
cache_alignment : 64
address sizes : 48 bits physical, 48 bits virtual
power management: ts ttp tm stc 100mhzsteps hwpstate
processor : 2
vendor_id : AuthenticAMD
cpu family : 16
model : 4
model name : AMD Phenom(tm) II X4 955 Processor
stepping : 2
microcode : 0x10000db
cpu MHz : 800.000
cache size : 512 KB
physical id : 0
siblings : 4
core id : 2
cpu cores : 4
apicid : 2
initial apicid : 2
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 5
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush mmx fxsr sse sse2 ht syscall nx mmxext fxsr_opt pdpe1gb rdtscp lm 3dnowext 3dnow constant_tsc rep_good nopl nonstop_tsc extd_apicid pni monitor cx16 popcnt lahf_lm cmp_legacy svm extapic cr8_legacy abm sse4a misalignsse 3dnowprefetch osvw ibs skinit wdt hw_pstate npt lbrv svm_lock nrip_save vmmcall
bugs : tlb_mmatch apic_c1e fxsave_leak sysret_ss_attrs
bogomips : 6443.01
TLB size : 1024 4K pages
clflush size : 64
cache_alignment : 64
address sizes : 48 bits physical, 48 bits virtual
power management: ts ttp tm stc 100mhzsteps hwpstate
processor : 3
vendor_id : AuthenticAMD
cpu family : 16
model : 4
model name : AMD Phenom(tm) II X4 955 Processor
stepping : 2
microcode : 0x10000db
cpu MHz : 800.000
cache size : 512 KB
physical id : 0
siblings : 4
core id : 3
cpu cores : 4
apicid : 3
initial apicid : 3
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 5
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush mmx fxsr sse sse2 ht syscall nx mmxext fxsr_opt pdpe1gb rdtscp lm 3dnowext 3dnow constant_tsc rep_good nopl nonstop_tsc extd_apicid pni monitor cx16 popcnt lahf_lm cmp_legacy svm extapic cr8_legacy abm sse4a misalignsse 3dnowprefetch osvw ibs skinit wdt hw_pstate npt lbrv svm_lock nrip_save vmmcall
bugs : tlb_mmatch apic_c1e fxsave_leak sysret_ss_attrs
bogomips : 6443.01
TLB size : 1024 4K pages
clflush size : 64
cache_alignment : 64
address sizes : 48 bits physical, 48 bits virtual
power management: ts ttp tm stc 100mhzsteps hwpstate
$ cat /proc/meminfo
MemTotal: 8173184 kB
MemFree: 2239320 kB
MemAvailable: 4539680 kB
Buffers: 345284 kB
Cached: 2134436 kB
SwapCached: 0 kB
Active: 3282860 kB
Inactive: 2134660 kB
Active(anon): 2065252 kB
Inactive(anon): 1175340 kB
Active(file): 1217608 kB
Inactive(file): 959320 kB
Unevictable: 28 kB
Mlocked: 28 kB
SwapTotal: 8257532 kB
SwapFree: 8257532 kB
Dirty: 1576 kB
Writeback: 0 kB
AnonPages: 2937868 kB
Mapped: 562068 kB
Shmem: 302768 kB
Slab: 224736 kB
SReclaimable: 166008 kB
SUnreclaim: 58728 kB
KernelStack: 6784 kB
PageTables: 40728 kB
NFS_Unstable: 0 kB
Bounce: 0 kB
WritebackTmp: 0 kB
CommitLimit: 12344124 kB
Committed_AS: 6473712 kB
VmallocTotal: 34359738367 kB
VmallocUsed: 357364 kB
VmallocChunk: 34358947836 kB
HardwareCorrupted: 0 kB
AnonHugePages: 0 kB
HugePages_Total: 0
HugePages_Free: 0
HugePages_Rsvd: 0
HugePages_Surp: 0
Hugepagesize: 2048 kB
DirectMap4k: 1465984 kB
DirectMap2M: 6920192 kB
DirectMap1G: 0 kB
$ aplay -l
**** List of PLAYBACK Hardware Devices ****
card 0: SB [HDA ATI SB], device 0: ALC887-VD Analog [ALC887-VD Analog]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 0: SB [HDA ATI SB], device 1: ALC887-VD Digital [ALC887-VD Digital]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 3: HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 7: HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 8: HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
card 1: NVidia [HDA NVidia], device 9: HDMI 0 [HDMI 0]
Subdevices: 1/1
Subdevice #0: subdevice #0
# cat /sys/devices/virtual/dmi/id/board_*
M5A97 R2.0
ASUSTeK COMPUTER INC.
Rev 1.xx
I have no idea what's going wrong here so any help is greatly appreciated.
