My Mac randomly plays a repeating drum sound...as if a key is held down in error.....It comes on when the machine is not in use - or even sleeping. If I unplug the keyborad, it stops, but will come back again later. I've taken to shutting the machine down altogether to avoid. Could this be a virus? Any ideas/things that I sould do to investigate?
Thanks in advance for your help....
iMac (27-inch Mid 2010), Mac OS X (10.7.4)
Does the display remain black during the entire episode? If it doesn't, then I suggest opening the Language & Text Sytem Preferences then click on the Input Sources button. Once open, turn ON the 'Keyboard & Character Viewer' option which make it possible for you to view a virtual keyboard on the display. The next time the issue occurs watch the virtual keyboard to see whether a particular key is highlighted indicating that the key is being activated. If it's consistently the same key then you likely have a keyboard problem. If the key is random then there may be some other sort of software issue. Please report your findings so that we can provide additional assistance.
Enable Keyboard Viewer in Language & Text System Preferences
View Keyboard Viewer on screen by pulling down the flag in the upper right corner of the menu bar and then select 'Show Keyboard Viewer'.
You will see a visual representation of your keyboard. In this example I have the USB keyboard. Each time a key is pressed the keycap will darken for as long as the key is pressed.
Hi..
Very unlikely it's a virus.
Check System Preferences > Sound > Sound Effects
Deselect: Play user interface sound effects
See if that makes a difference.
And check New messages sound in Mail > Prefwerences > General
Do you have another keyboard you could try? Does it wake up from a sleeping mode when this occurs? When you say you unplug the keyboard and it stops but comes back later, have you reinstalled the keyboard or is it still unplugged? Don't think it would be a virus.
Having exact same problem as the OP. Definitely sounds like the keyboard error sound. Cannot discover any rhyme or reason to what starts it- It'll happen with no programs open, but sound will stop when I close a program or a webpage, and sometime noise will re-occur very soon, or later on. Tried the keyboard viewer suggestion: no keys were indicated. Also tried deselecting the Sound Effects: it had no effect. Thanks for any help or insight.
i have a drum sound on my mac
