I have been using 18.11.18, on a low-spec Windows 10 machine.
I have found that when I add in an audio track, I get skipping, crackling, and popping. This doesn’t happen at all points in the audio file, but once it does happen it’s consistently happening in that section.
This happens both in the timeline and in the final file after exporting.
The audio I’ve been using are FLAC files, generated with Audacity. I’ve tried different Audacity export settings (lowering the quality, etc) but no change.
I’ve tried high quality video and simple images, to see if it is a performance issue, but it’s the same result.
The workaround was to download 18.09.16. Using this version, I don’t have an issue.
I haven’t tried other versions, so I’m not sure where this issue was introduced.