Annoying buzzing noise!

[Moo]

My PC has recently developed a rather annoying buzzing noise that comes
through the headphone (or monitor speakers) in certain situations.

The buzzing will occur as follows:

1) When scrolling up and down a webpage, it does it in firefox 2.0 but
is much worse in IE7 and also much worse if using the mouse wheel
instead of dragging the page down using the scroll bar.

2) When maximising and minimising windows, there is a quick whining noise.

3) Whenever the mouse (a wireless Trust AMI mouse 250SP) is moved over
certain areas, see the below picture for details:

http://mysite.orange.co.uk/ebaylowe/pictures/buzzing.jpg

Moving the mouse from google earth to the right it will stop buzzing, it
will not buzz in the space areas of google earth either, but always does
so when moving over the top of the earth...

Can anyone help!?

 

[Moo]

My PC has recently developed a rather annoying buzzing noise that comes
through the headphone (or monitor speakers) in certain situations.

The buzzing will occur as follows:

1) When scrolling up and down a webpage, it does it in firefox 2.0 but
is much worse in IE7 and also much worse if using the mouse wheel
instead of dragging the page down using the scroll bar.

2) When maximising and minimising windows, there is a quick whining noise.

3) Whenever the mouse (a wireless Trust AMI mouse 250SP) is moved over
certain areas, see the below picture for details:

http://mysite.orange.co.uk/ebaylowe/pictures/buzzing.jpg

Moving the mouse from google earth to the right it will stop buzzing, it
will not buzz in the space areas of google earth either, but always does
so when moving over the top of the earth...

Can anyone help!?

Sorry, forgot to say:

It is an onboard AC97 soundcard (on a Abit IC7 motherboard), the
headphones are plugged into a Philips 190x6 flatscreen monitor, in turn
a cable runs from the monitor and into the onboard soundcard (green
connector).

 

[Adam Russell]

Sorry, forgot to say:

It is an onboard AC97 soundcard (on a Abit IC7 motherboard), the
headphones are plugged into a Philips 190x6 flatscreen monitor, in turn a
cable runs from the monitor and into the onboard soundcard (green
connector).

Well first thing Id think of is whether you need to reinstall sound drivers,
but I dont know if onboard sound has drivers. Check the website for your
motherboard. Second thing to try is plug headphones into the back of the
computer instead of through the monitor, or maybe Id try that first
actually.

 

[Grinder]

Sorry, forgot to say:

It is an onboard AC97 soundcard (on a Abit IC7 motherboard), the
headphones are plugged into a Philips 190x6 flatscreen monitor, in turn
a cable runs from the monitor and into the onboard soundcard (green
connector).

Just to isolate factors, I would try using a different, wired mouse to
see if it alters the effect.

 

[Paul]

Sorry, forgot to say:

It is an onboard AC97 soundcard (on a Abit IC7 motherboard), the
headphones are plugged into a Philips 190x6 flatscreen monitor, in turn
a cable runs from the monitor and into the onboard soundcard (green
connector).

If you have an analog cable running to the back of your CDROM drive, I'd
remove it. They function like an antenna, for electrical interference.
At least on my machine, I can get CD audio without the cable, by using
DAE (digital audio extraction, travels over the CD ribbon cable).

Using the mixer control panel for the sound system, mute all unused
input sources.

As Adam suggested, connect headphone directly to the computer, to eliminate
interference picked up at the monitor.

In some cases, purchasing a separate sound card will fix this. And the
sound card does not have to be expensive. I'm using a $7 sound card.
My card uses a CMI8738, and cards based on that chip sell from $7 to
$70. Just be careful not to get taken, by spending $70 on one.

These cards are not all winners. Read the comments on this one:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16829180002

Paul

 

[kony]

If you have an analog cable running to the back of your CDROM drive, I'd
remove it. They function like an antenna, for electrical interference.
At least on my machine, I can get CD audio without the cable, by using
DAE (digital audio extraction, travels over the CD ribbon cable).

Using the mixer control panel for the sound system, mute all unused
input sources.

As Adam suggested, connect headphone directly to the computer, to eliminate
interference picked up at the monitor.

In some cases, purchasing a separate sound card will fix this. And the
sound card does not have to be expensive. I'm using a $7 sound card.
My card uses a CMI8738, and cards based on that chip sell from $7 to
$70. Just be careful not to get taken, by spending $70 on one.

These cards are not all winners. Read the comments on this one:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16829180002

When it comes to drivers and OS issues, it can help to
completely ignore comments by Newegg customers. They'll go
on and on about not getting drivers to work, but seldom if
ever do they just go to the chipset manufacturer's website
and get current drivers. The problem is so bad there were
even people posting about problems getting common-as-dirt
Realtek 8139 based NICs to work, not finding even a 'nix or
mac driver. I wonder what they would do if their
motherboard happened to have same chip and the mainboard
manufacturer had provided the identical driver version.

The main problem with the above card seems to be that it has
no onboard power R/LC filtering or linear regulation (unless
the TO92 blob in the upper right of the picture is a 78L05,
which it might be but this card definitely scrimps on
parts). There are tons of cards under $15 to choose from,
or for about $20 many people like the Chaintech AV-710 for 2
channel uses.

 

[Guest]

My PC has recently developed a rather annoying buzzing noise that comes

through the headphone (or monitor speakers) in certain situations.

Check the cables are plugged in correctly (ie, pushed all the way in - some
cables too, even new ones, may have been kinked at some point causing the
wiring inside to fracture and break the sound if the wire is vibrated by
movements near the wire). If it was a wired mouse I would say that probably
your mouse cable is disturbing the sound cable as you're moving it around,
but as you're on wireless, then that's probably not the case here.

I've noticed if the sound out is amplified greatly through any system then
you get some element of buzz - whether it be from the pickup and
amplification of fans inside the PC - components with fans transferring
sound through the mobo onto the soundcard / the wires connected to the
soundcard. Also it could be cheapo speakers / cables / duff sound card
drivers or even mouse drivers.

Incidentally when everything is really quiet, I can hear my wireless mouse
beeping with every moment I make with it - I guess I can just about hear the
wireless frequency it communicates on - not a loud noise or a hissy noise,
but a mild beeping noise nonetheless. In your case, it may also be where
this noise is being picked up and amplified by your equipment too. Its
really a process of elimination. Try a wired mouse, try another wireless
mouse, try driver updates, try a different amplifier / speakers / soundcard,
etc.

Good luck - I can appreaciate how annoying it can be - especially if you
listen to music whilst you surf.