Way To Change Steam Deck’s Audio Frequency?

[[SHIGU] Taco Hanger]

While playing Cyberpunk 2077 on my Deck while docked, the game will get massive amounts of crackling audio which seems to be a common issue for the game.

One common solution suggested is changing the audio frequency to 16 bit 480000 Hz. I’ve looked through desktop mode and can’t find a way to change this setting on the deck.

Is it even possible? If anyone has an answer or another kind of solution for this problem, it would be greatly appreciated.

[Alice ♡]

Terminal -> sudo steamos-readonly disable
Terminal -> sudo nano /etc/pulse/client.conf

Input the following (24bit 192khz)

default-sample-format = s24le
default-sample-rate = 192000
resample-method = speex-float-5

Save and Exit
Press CTRL+O, Press Ctrl+X

Terminal -> sudo steamos-readonly enable

[[SHIGU] Taco Hanger]

Originally posted by Benyamin:

Terminal -> sudo steamos-readonly disable
Terminal -> sudo nano /etc/pulse/client.conf

Input the following (24bit 192khz)

default-sample-format = s24le
default-sample-rate = 192000
resample-method = speex-float-5

Save and Exit
Press CTRL+O, Press Ctrl+X

Terminal -> sudo steamos-readonly enable

Thank you for the help! Just figured it out and here’s the solution: Turn controller vibration all the way down to zero. Even if you have no controller connected, it completely removed the crackling audio.

Thank you again!

[Vrsaran]

Originally posted by SHIGU Taco Hanger:

Originally posted by Benyamin:

Terminal -> sudo steamos-readonly disable
Terminal -> sudo nano /etc/pulse/client.conf

Input the following (24bit 192khz)

default-sample-format = s24le
default-sample-rate = 192000
resample-method = speex-float-5

Save and Exit
Press CTRL+O, Press Ctrl+X

Terminal -> sudo steamos-readonly enable

Thank you for the help! Just figured it out and here’s the solution: Turn controller vibration all the way down to zero. Even if you have no controller connected, it completely removed the crackling audio.

Thank you again!

That problem was driving me crazy. Thanks for the tip on turning off vibration.

[drbob]

Originally posted by Benjy:

Terminal -> sudo steamos-readonly disable
Terminal -> sudo nano /etc/pulse/client.conf

Input the following (24bit 192khz)

default-sample-format = s24le
default-sample-rate = 192000
resample-method = speex-float-5

Save and Exit
Press CTRL+O, Press Ctrl+X

Terminal -> sudo steamos-readonly enable

This is wrong. It's not necessary to disable read only to edit files in /etc on a SteamOS.

You also don't need to use the terminal (other than to set a password for the deck account with passwd if you haven't already done so), the Kate GUI editor will work fine & prompt you for the password when needed.

/etc/pulse/client.conf is the wrong place[manpages.org] to set the sample rate. In a pulseaudio system the correct place would be[manpages.org] /etc/pulse/daemon.conf, however SteamOS uses PipeWire[wiki.archlinux.org] which has a module that emulates PulseAudio, but is configured differently. Per the PipeWire documentation[gitlab.freedesktop.org], to set the sample rate, you need to put a conf file in /etc/pipewire/pipewire.conf.d/ which defines default.clock.rate

For example to set the default sample rate to 48000 you could create a samplerates.conf file in either /etc/pipewire/pipewire.conf.d/ or ~/.config/pipewire/pipewire.conf.d/ with the following contents:

default.clock.rate =  48000

It isn't possible to set a resample method with PipeWire, as it uses it's own built in resampler[wiki.archlinux.org].

If you really want to set the default sample format for PulseAudio clients, you can do that by editing pulse.default.format in /etc/pipewire/pipewire-pulse.conf, see here[docs.pipewire.org] but it shouldn't be necessary.