Audio fades in after computer is idle for a few minutes

[peterscherr]

Here's a little puzzle:

I've recently updated my itunes to 11.1.5. Mac OS 10.6.8

The most annoying "feature" is that after I pause playback for more than a minute, the sound fades in when playback is started again.

It blows, because you miss important stuff. Like if I am learning a song and I pause to write down the chords and then go on to the next section I miss the first few bars of that. Or if I am listening to a lecture and I pause to think about the last paragraph, when I start up again, I miss the first sentence of the next part. Why?

It has nothing to do with the "crossfade between songs" preference, which is of course, not selected.

And even worse, this is now happening with pro tools. I leave it idle for a few moments, and when I start playback it fades in. I really hate this!

(A pointless but entertaining aside: how would video editors feel if this was happening with their video in fcp after they stopped playback to do something else for a moment???? tho I am certain that there are plenty of annoyances in fcp too...)

Any helpful hints on disabling this?

Thanks all.

Pete