hello friends
I am struggling for a couple of days to fix it!

problem is, in the DAW or windows media player or KMPlayer(not normalizing audio), when the audio signal reaches near 0 dB, there is sounds like distortion but there is not any distortion!
how do I know?
I am mixing for over 5 years and almost from the beginning, I was limiting the master bus gain under -0.3 dB. but when I am limiting about -0.5, crackle is lower and under -0.6, there is almost non!

I was in win 11. changed it to 10. installed all drivers carefully and used the universal driver that PreSonus gave to me in my PreSonus panel. and still, crackle is there!

I use headphones for mixing and under -0.6 dB, it is clean with no crackle. but it should be clean even when you are limiting 0dB!
this is only audible, not effective on the audio! after export, there was nothing.

what is wrong guys? what am I missing? or messing?:/

please help. I will be thankful and ... more thankful!