franky has text me an update.
a failed switch is the cause of the problem. the backup switch cannot take the strain and keeps failing. the owner is driving down with a new switch as we speak. depending on how far he is from the data centre, the problem should be sorted soon.
it might be an idea for you to invest in a good usb soundcard. if you want the best possible sound from your laptop, you're going to have to use a better device than what's onboard.
can you put your tunes onto a solid state memory device? my latency still spikes but now it's once every 2 minutes and it's just above 1000 when i does. other than that, it sits quite low.
i don't use midi at the moment so all my audio ir routed from my mixer into the pc (output turned off) and also routed to a stereo amp (booth). so i don't hear the delay and everything is synced when i stream.
not sure if it's worth anything but my latency goes up when i use my mouse. have you updated any input devices recently? updating my chipset drivers have also reduced the amount of times my latency goes up past the 1000 mark.
great ending to an interesting thread.
EDIT: Logitech setpoint seems to be causing this latency issue for me.
a boost is a boost. it can also show how much boost he's not getting if his turbo ever breaks or shows signs of breaking.
and let's be honest dude, you're not the one who has to look at it every time you drive so each to their own i guess. i thought he did a tidy install and the boost gauge works.
(in response to the link you posted)to tune your sound to its best, get some bass test audio and tweak the gains until you get the clearest sound. bass will travel through your car but mids and tops just bounce of objects.
turn your stereo to a volume that you would most use and set the bass to such an extent that it isn't the most dominant sound coming from the speaker. because bass is omnidirectional, you don't need much of it to get the rich sounds you are looking for. you don't want to hear any vibrations from the car other than the bass. once you get vibrations from the car, your sound will be distorted and spending all that cash for better quality sound will be nothing but a waste.
i have similar issues. but it's not caused my tunes to stop. they just sounded like they were clipping a bit. turning of "Cool and Quiet" in my bios (AMD board)reduced the problem but didn't solve it. also reducing the output quality helped with the clipping too. i think i'll follow this thread to see if any further options appear.