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Sound stuttering after Mountain Lion install

Dear community,


after having installed OSX Mountain Lion my sound startet stuttering whenever there is rapid movement on my screen.

This includes e.g. window movement, scrolling through image loaded websites or video playback (flash player, quicktime).

A restart didn't help. I'm using stereo output, not digital.


I have connected a second monitor but the problem persists after disconnecting it. Movement on the second monitor also causes the sound to stutter.

My GPU Diode temperature is at 85°C (there is some bug that keeps the GPU under load while a second monitor is connected AFAIK), but I guess it was the same under Snow Leopard.


In Snow Leopard the sound output was always perfect even under heavy load or heavy HDD I/O.


Any ideas?

iMac (27-inch Mid 2011), OS X Mountain Lion

Posted on Jul 28, 2012 5:48 AM

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Posted on Jul 28, 2012 3:22 PM

I am also having this issue as well.


I opened Activity Monitor and noticed that during the stuttering, coreaudiod jumps in CPU usage, often past 5%. I have also noticed graphics lag when this occurs if I'm doing something like watching full-screen video or gaming.


I'm currently experiencing this on mid 2011 iMac 27" as well as a 24" iMac 2009 model I use at work.

1,223 replies

Dec 3, 2012 8:16 PM in response to Crimguy

I also have the 2GB 6970 iMac and had unbearable sound stuttering, beach balls and graphics glitches.


I've installed the 10.8.3 beta and all problems seem to be gone. I'll be sure to update if anything comes back.


For any Apple spies that may be monitoring this forum, I don't care the slightest about breaking any NDA, copyright law or whatever. This problem has been very frustrating and unbearable and should've been fixed much earlier.

Dec 3, 2012 8:26 PM in response to Savasp

I agree. I don't really care about any Apple policies anymore. I advocate in both business and personal for my contacts to avoid Apple computers now at all costs. I post evidence of these issues on social media, and every other outlet. They have no respect for those who got them here. As a result I applaud the day they return to a struggling company.

Dec 3, 2012 9:34 PM in response to pepper_chico

I'll put it this way. With Windows I can install my own drivers and have more say over my computer. With Apple you are at the mercy of them to "make it just work". They have fallen so far short of this mark and the price we pay for these machines there is no excuse that is acceptable. They haven't even apologized for it. It's our dollars and time that is being wasted by this. And Apple would never take my machines and replace them, so that's a moot point. At least windows makes my mac run better than Mountain Goat. Pretty sad to spend all that money on pretty hardware and then have to resort to Windows. But I suppose the beauty of windows is it actually is stable. It can play music like my $100 iPod and not stutter.


Instead I've got two dozen hours plus on the phone troubleshooting and another dozen just wasting my time talking to someone who doesn't have a care in the world about resolving the matter. Unless they right this with me I'm finished with them. It's so disheartening how they handle these matters with silence that it is deafening. I won't ever forget this.


I will be curious if the log notes say anything in 10.8.3 about this update fixing the issue or they secretly slip it in. Apple is two faced in they portray themselves to be one thing and are a completly different beast on the other side of things.

Dec 4, 2012 12:22 PM in response to BarrettF77

BarrettF77 wrote:


I'm tempted to get a torrent and try it. Apple should post their updates like Nvidia. They have channels you can get beta video drivers from Nvidia. And since OSX is a beta anyways, why wait! I would guess they release it either before Christmas by a week on case some critical issue is found or they wait till mid January.


I'm tempted too, but I can't risk it on my production machine. Looks like 10.8.3 is just under half a gig, that's alot of data which could be buggy, especially considering it's only the first beta release.

Dec 5, 2012 6:49 AM in response to Anthonysanto

Anthonysanto wrote:


Just formatted my hard drive. Wiped it clean, and installed Mountain Lion over the clean drive. So far no problems. I imagine I'm not the first one in this discussion to try that. Correct?


This issue can be frequent or elusively sporadic. It looks like a graphics driver issue, so try using iTunes consistently for a few days with your normal workflow and I dare say the problem will likely resurface. I know there are others who have posted here saying re-installs had no effect long term.


Just to add, my ML install was cleanly installed over a zeroed HD.

Sound stuttering after Mountain Lion install

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