It followed an update to the Realtek driver and software and seemed to involve it's device detection feature. I wish I could remember more about this but I'm fairly certain I had to either use an older driver or change the front output to AC97 to make this stop. Interestingly, I had no trouble with a Linux distro on the machine. Although it didn't support all of the published features of the Realtek device, I didn't have the stopping/starting syndrome at all. I'd try an older driver or see if the legacy mode works.
My audio goes out for 1-2 seconds every 10-20 seconds and Realtek audio keeps spamming the device connected/disconnected message, I had to disable notifications. I think it has something to do with the motherboard but this started happening on my old motherboard and is still happening on my new one. Anyone have any ideas?

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