[antholeole]

I experience this and have this exact model, and it is a mostly software issue. I don’t get this problem when my computer isn’t doing much, but when I’m using a ton of CPU, the crackling begins.

It isn’t a problem when connected to my AirPods, so I just pop them in when I’m doing some heavy work.

Annoying, but not a deal breaker for me.

[robinhood]

I have this MBP too and I experience this crackling noise too, only when watching a video though. And I never, ever use a ton of CPU, so I doubt this is caused by the CPU having a high usage. First time it happened, I was scared as I thought I broke something, but now I kinda got used to it, unfortunately.

[jaggerlink]

While it seems to only be a temporary fix, the steps in this comment have fixed it for me so far: https://reddit.com/r/macbookpro/comments/qmpg3k/_/hw9zmgm/

[fortran77]

I’m surprised Apple users put up with this. It’s supposed to be a premium experience.

[bzzzt]

Makes you wonder if this is something every user experiences or some weird corner case.

Seems Apple forgets old bugs after a few years. I recall having crackling audio on my 2015 Macbook pro which was fixed within weeks after release, but required a SMC reset to kill the old code messing with the audio...

[kitsunesoba]

Every platform comes with tradeoffs, it’s just a matter of what you can live with. There is no silver bullet.

As someone who works with macOS, Windows, and Linux regularly, macOS works the best for me as general-purpose/daily-driver, with the other two filling more single-purpose use cases.

[TomVDB]

They are complaining about it… That’s why it’s here on the front page of HN.