Sound playback delays

Sound playback on my machine seems to be delayed. Playing an error beep hangs for half a second or so before playing, making tab completion extremely irritating (because the completion itself also hangs); starting a video or music track is silent for the first second or so. This seems to be fixed, as per http://askubuntu.com/questions/218444/sound-output-starts-delayed/440787#440787, by disabling pulseaudio's "module-suspend-on-idle" feature. I don't need this feature at all because my machine is a desktop box without a battery, permanently plugged into power, and therefore any minimal power saving it produces is far outweighed by the annoyance. However, since other people don't experience this problem, perhaps it's chipset specific? I also experience Audacity taking a long time to start up, which also seems to have been helped by this fix.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 16.04
Package: pulseaudio 1:8.0-0ubuntu3.2
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 4.4.0-66.87-generic 4.4.44
Uname: Linux 4.4.0-66-generic x86_64
ApportVersion: 2.20.1-0ubuntu2.5
Architecture: amd64
CurrentDesktop: GNOME
Date: Wed Mar 29 11:56:24 2017
InstallationDate: Installed on 2014-04-07 (1087 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 13.10 "Saucy Salamander" - Release amd64 (20131016.1)
SourcePackage: pulseaudio
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to xenial on 2016-08-04 (237 days ago)
dmi.bios.date: 12/13/2013
dmi.bios.vendor: American Megatrends Inc.
dmi.bios.version: 1707
dmi.board.asset.tag: To be filled by O.E.M.
dmi.board.name: Z87-A
dmi.board.vendor: ASUSTeK COMPUTER INC.
dmi.board.version: Rev 1.xx
dmi.chassis.asset.tag: PCS
dmi.chassis.type: 3
dmi.chassis.vendor: PC SPECIALIST
dmi.chassis.version: Chassis Version
dmi.modalias: dmi:bvnAmericanMegatrendsInc.:bvr1707:bd12/13/2013:svnASUS:pnAllSeries:pvrSystemVersion:rvnASUSTeKCOMPUTERINC.:rnZ87-A:rvrRev1.xx:cvnPCSPECIALIST:ct3:cvrChassisVersion:
dmi.product.name: All Series
dmi.product.version: System Version
dmi.sys.vendor: ASUS
modified.conffile..etc.pulse.default.pa: [modified]
mtime.conffile..etc.pulse.default.pa: 2017-03-29T11:51:11.884294