I had a similar headphone crackle issue when setting up an XPS13 with Arch Linux. There's a good guide here : https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Dell_XPS_13

I had a similar headphone crackle issue when setting up an XPS13 with Arch Linux. There's a good guide here : https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Dell_XPS_13_(9350)#High_noise_floor_when_using_headphones https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Dell_XPS_13_(9350)#High... Using alsamixer, I set 'Headphone Mic Boost Volume' to be 22. Then persisted the change with 'sudo alsactl store'. I haven't experienced the other issues with Arch, though.