Hi all,

I'm having an ongoing issue with audio stuttering and chopping when playing games through Steam. This started right after the recent Steam Client Update and affects all games, regardless of intensity or size (e.g., Hitman: World of Assassination, Ace Attorney Trilogy).

Symptoms:
- Audio starts off fine, then after 10–15 minutes begins to stutter or drop intermittently.

- Issue occurs whether I'm using speakers, headphones, or monitor audio.

- Happens even when I don’t alt-tab or have background apps open.

- Issue persists even after disabling the Steam overlay and hardware acceleration.

- Not present in non-Steam applications (e.g., YouTube, VLC, etc.)

What I’ve Tried:
- Reinstalled Steam

-Verified game files

-Disabled Steam overlay + Steam Input

-Changed audio output devices and sample rates

-Disabled GPU audio devices (e.g., NVIDIA HD Audio)

-Ran LatencyMon — no DPC issues detected

-Clean boot with all non-Microsoft services disabled

-Tried offline mode (but some games require online access)

-Updated audio and GPU drivers


System Notes:
- Games run perfectly otherwise (no FPS drops or crashes).

- No audio issues outside of Steam games.

- Nothing changed in my hardware setup — this started immediately after the latest Steam update.


Any thoughts?

It seems like something in the recent Steam client is interfering with the audio stack at runtime. I'd appreciate any help, tips, or confirmations from others experiencing this. Would love to know if there's a workaround — or if a rollback is possible until Steam fixes this.

Thanks in advance!