On Thu, Jan 1, 2009 at 4:06 AM, Alan McKinnon <alan.mckin...@gmail.com> wrote: > On Wednesday 31 December 2008 17:36:39 Paul Hartman wrote: >> I can't remember the exact reasoning, but I do recall being told "it's >> normal" and that it varies from one system to another, even with the >> same hardware. I think it's related to capacitors or voltage regulator >> or something like that. (I am not an electrical engineer) > > If it's consistent with high load, it's most likely inductors windowing > vibrating inside their casing. i.e. loosely wound transformers. The biggest > one is in the power supply, which is easy enough to swap out and check. > > The irritating part is that it's extremely hard to detect where the sound > comes from - you can't just turn your head to get the direction as human ears > aren't too good at those frequencies > >> When trying KDE4 with all the desktop effects, it was really annoying, >> everything I did would cause the hissing noise, presumably because >> it's using more CPU load to do basic things. >> >> So, in other words, "it's normal". :) > > Harmless, yes. Annoying, yes. Normal, should not be :-) > > This happens when vendors use cut-rate components, or the Chinese factory they > outsourced the production to uses crappy parts.
I went back in my old emails and Abit's (R.I.P.) explanation for me was that the noise comes from the digital PWM and it's normal...
