My computer is loud.

[triadruid]

Really, really, quietly loud.

That probably seems nonsensical. It's my work computer, so it has no speakers, right? So I brought in headphones... I can't tell if the headphones are just TOO good, or if something's bollixed up in this box, but it...hums. And clicks. And buzzes. All. The. TIME.

• Scrolling a page? Buzzzzzz.
  
• Animated GIF? Tick.tick.tick.tick.
  
• Popup-text? Click.
  
• Loading webpage? Whirrrrr.
  
• Clock advancing by one second? Tick. (sometimes)
  
• Maximizing/minimizing window? Whiiiine.
  
• Been stationary too long? Roll 1d8, consult "annoying noises" chart.

Curiously, muting the computer's master volume control doesn't stop the noises. So today is a music-free day...

Comments

[lexpendragon.livejournal.com]

Could it be the incoming microphone noises? Try verifying that the sound card has the right drivers, and that all the 'recording' volumes are appropriate. If you aren't recording anything or Skype or anything 'mute' is appropriate.

[triadruid.livejournal.com]

Muting inputs didn't change it either; and no microphone on this machine.

[liquidfun.livejournal.com]

Is the noise related directly to things you are doing, or unrelated?

I know if a Blackberry (worst offenders), an AT&T phone (not sure if that includes iPhones), or a few other cel devices get within six feet of my work computer I get all kinds of random noise whenever the device checks in with the towers ... and it is worse if a message actually gets sent/received.

With all of our consultants (and occasionally other people like me) getting issued Blackberries, I can now recognize the characteristic Blackberry noise as being noticeably different from the other devices (diagnosing oddities "by ear").

PS - my work is pretty friendly, I actually have speakers that are OK, which I supplemented by bringing in a subwoofer from home...

[rfunk.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I have similar problems with my (ancient) Verizon phone. I even know my phone will ring before it does because of the interference in my speakers.

[triadruid.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I know the phone/radio noise you're talking about - that's not this.

[featherynscale.livejournal.com]

Check the volume on yer in-line (mic).

[triadruid.livejournal.com]

No dice (see reply to Lex). Is that something you've encountered before, though?

I've never noticed this particular quirk before in WinXP...

[featherynscale.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it's more of an audio thing generally than a WinXP thing, though, I think. Other thing, if there's more than one option on the back of the board that looks like you might want to plug headphones into it, you might try the other one. Some sound cards have two speaker jacks, but you want to plug into the primary one first. Dunno if you've got that, though.

[uberreiniger.livejournal.com]

Free of music, but never free of sound...

[triadruid.livejournal.com]

Seriously. I just noticed one additional charming sound:

Clock advancing by one second? Tick. (but not all the time)

[kaymyth.livejournal.com]

Clearly, your computer has been taken over by pixies.

[triadruid.livejournal.com]

It's all the damn D&D.

[auraseer.livejournal.com]

Try turning off the audio outputs one by one. I've seen one machine apparently have this problem because of RF noise through a bad internal audio cable. The noise was audible no matter what I used, but muting CD Audio output fixed the problem temporarily, and replacing the internal audio cable fixed it permanently.

Another possibility: does the headphone cable run near your monitor? A few jobs ago, I had a setup where I got headphone noise every time the screen image changed significantly. That turned out to be caused by the old CRT monitor, which spewed intereference depending on the overall brightness of the image.

[triadruid.livejournal.com]

Just killed all the audio sliders one by one about ten minutes ago. Makes no difference; neither does global mute.

The monitor idea is a good one, except that we use LCDs and the only thing the cable is particularly near is the keyboard (which doesn't seem to affect it at all). However I did try flipping back to my old crappy headphones and the noise is softer, so I suspect it's a lack of shielding on these El Cheapo headphones (I think they're the default iPoD set). So you may be onto something after all... there's a definite background hum that you never heard with the old set. Which sucks, because the reason I switched is the old ones had lost their earbud cushions.

[malvito.livejournal.com]

I've been trying to change my computer's sound scheme to something in a Star Trek mode, and cannot seem to get it to work. Not sure what I am doing wrong. If this continues I might see about inviting you all over for dinner, friendly chatting, and geek classes.

Which seems unrelated to your post, but at least you seem to be getting interesting sounds from your 'puter.

[triadruid.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I remember something about how to do that. Which flavor of Windows are you running?

We'll be completely unavailable until we get back from vacation circa 7/23, but after that should be reasonable.

[malvito.livejournal.com]

Not a problem ... more opportunities for me to download bitchin' WAV files.

[adammaker.livejournal.com]

Steal a magnetic choke coil from a USB wire that does not need it, tape it to your headphone cord at some point along the length and your conducted interference will fade to nothing.

http://archive.evaluationengineering.com/archive/articles/0602usb.htm

[adammaker.livejournal.com]

http://www.radioshack.com/sm-snap-together-ferrite-choke-core--pi-2103222.html
-
this!!!
but you can find them cheaper elsewhere.

[triadruid.livejournal.com]

Whether it works or not, that's a good trick to keep in mind... thanks!

[biscuitgod.livejournal.com]

I'm no geek, but I remember some years back that there was a virus someone put out that did just that. . . added noises to general computer stuff. Probably not your problem, but I do remember having to download a scubber to get rid of it.

[matchgirl42.livejournal.com]

Are you sure it's software and not hardware related? Maybe some piece of hardware deciding to pitch a fit? A wire got too close to the heat exhaust fan maybe?

[triadruid.livejournal.com]

This isn't a constant noise like something's loose, it's just tied to certain actions. Probably a lack of shielding on the iPod headphones, since they're not designed to be next to a 'real' computer...

Noise pickup

[fenton.livejournal.com]

I know that several folks have posted about possible noise sources, and you've tried several things, but after looking at the symptoms and the attempts so far, here's my guess (if I wander off into jargon-land, please ask; I plead being an audio geek, amateur radio geek, and electronics geek as well as a computer geek):

You're getting induced noise in your audio path from something that is 'leaking'. Given that it isn't steady, it probably isn't from a power supply (those can produce either 60Hz 'hum', or a high whine, but generally do so consistently).

The fact that it happens in the ways that it does, and that you have an LCD monitor, make me suspect that it is probably something involving your graphics, but quite possibly *not* your monitor or monitor feed cable. As you note, LCDs don't leak the way CRTs do, though they *can* still leak -- but if they do, it is likely to be a fairly constant, mostly *steady* thing, since (like CRTs), they get data continuously.

The video card, however, only utilizes (significant) processor when it is actually processing a *change* in the contents of the video buffer. A 'buzz' (scrolling) can be composed of a large number of 'ticks' in rapid succession. The clock tick is a big hint, the animated GIF sound a bigger one. 'Whirr' on loading a page is probably due to the period update of the progress spinner, and 'whine' on minimize/maximize is a high-speed redraw. I'd bet that if you disable the 'animations' configuration, minimize/maximize will turn into a 'click' -- this is, in fact, probably a fairly good way to test the theory.

If you get it even when all of the portions of the sound card are muted, it means that you're probably picking it up from the neutral (or 'signal ground') line, which, on some cards, may never be disconnected (depends largely on whether the card is good enough to have the headphone circuit on an opto-isolator to decouple it from the main board, and most don't bother, as far as I know).

Unfortunately, there aren't a whole lot of ways to fix this that are practical in a work environment, short of simply contacting whoever handles IT hardware and letting them know. However, if the video card has started leaking badly enough to be audible, there is a good chance that it is undergoing progressive failure and will just keep getting worse until it stops functioning entirely.

Also, technically, a card that is leaking that badly *should* be pulled from use due to FCC regulations, but if it isn't producing interference that impacts anything else, you'll have a difficult time convincing most IT folks that it is worth it (mostly, the reason it should be pulled is that the EM shielding is no longer functioning up to the specification the FCC certified the device at, meaning it is now effectively an uncertified RF noise source).

Re: Noise pickup

[triadruid.livejournal.com]

All very good tips. Video card failure on this machine would not be out of the question, and would also be a Rather Bad Thing, as this is the only GIS-capable computer in our department.

I'll look into it when I get back in town. Thanks!