Computer making a weird faint chimes/ping sound

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Level 1

6 points

Computer making a weird faint chimes/ping sound

About every couple minutes, my computer is making a sort of chimes sound effect, like one would select as a sound effect for the operating system. It's really quiet. And completely new to this computer. Sounds like some routine that's looping has just completed (like the trash being emptied, though not that). . . and there's the rub. Which routine?

It was doing it when both hooked to the internet, and when I pulled the plug on my connection.

What could be causing it? What are the usual background routines running in OSX? I have Norton anti-virus, but don't know of any other program that could have been doing it.

Suggestions welcome.

Thanks.

G4 Dual 1.25s, Mac OS X (10.4.6)

Posted on Nov 12, 2006 5:29 PM

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Answer 1

D Akey Author

Level 1

6 points

Nov 12, 2006 6:09 PM in response to D Akey

Woah. After pulling the plug on my internet connection just a bit ago, I continued hearing the chime described in the last post. Then after a time, I just heard the Microsoft Windows XP "shutting down" sound at the same low volume level after I posted that last bit.

Clearly this is a MAC I'm on, and I have no emulators on this machine. My PC which is elsewhere has been off for a day.

I'm not in an apartment and it was not from a neighbor as they are abundantly far away to not hear their computers unless somehow someone's accessing my computer, deliberately or inadvertently.

Is there anything in the stock G4 with 10.4.8 that can allow someone/anyone access to my computer remotely in a bluetooth sort of way? I'm connected with DSL that's on a land line.

Are we dead certain that MACs don't get viruses and sypware?

I've suspected problems in the past when my external drive kept spinning on at about the rate that I heard this ping, It seemed to go away, but this one was audible and decidedly microsoft (i.e probably not coming from something in the background from one of my MAC programs).

This is really disconcerting.

Thanks.

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Answer 2

Nov 12, 2006 6:31 PM in response to D Akey

Your Mac probably is signalling a hardware problem, maybe bad RAM or some other component. Check the console logs to see if any sort of errors show up there.

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Answer 3

D Akey Author

Level 1

6 points

Nov 12, 2006 6:42 PM in response to Stanley Horwitz

Thanks. I wonder. . .

I'll look at that relative to the pinging. I had the volume set to full with my speakers all the way up. So since the sound was still faint, it was probably not intended/designed as an alert.

But, just out of curiosity, would there be any way the Win XP shutdown sound would have played at the same volume as the incessant minute-apart pings?

I rebooted and it has gone away for now. But the issue remains that weird things were happening. And if somebody was into my computer, they may have logged off per the shutdown sound.

I'm pretty sure it's more than my computer warning me of an imminent hardware failure.

Still open to suggestions.

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Answer 4

Nov 15, 2006 10:26 AM in response to D Akey

If you have external speakers, especially inexpensive (less than $300) ones that use analog wire for sound input - my guess is the cable is acting as an antenna and picking up noise from EMI (Electro-Magnetic Interference). You can help reduce that at high amplifications by adding a RF Choke to the cable near where it enters the speakers.

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Answer 5

D Akey Author

Level 1

6 points

Nov 18, 2006 10:54 PM in response to Michael Bradshaw

Well, that could explain the off the wall noises and the signature Windows sound.

My speakers came with my G4 from a dealer as a bundle when it was a new and near top of the line, about a month before the G5s came out.

Were the speakers cheap? Probably. Pretty good sound though. But no idea of the unit price for them.

The most perplexing thing about the noises is not knowing from whence they came. The noises are rare. Always tough when you can't deliberately repeat the anomaly.

Thanks for your suggestion. If/when it happens again, I'll consider a trip to the electonics shop for the RF Choke.

Meanwhile I still think it's time to study up on Bluetooth and Airport. Couldn't hurt.

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