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Question

Windows XP water droplet noise???

by Oct 29, 2013 9:19AM PDT

My mom recently got a Dell Inspiron 6000; Windows XP, we've only had it for a few months and no problems so far.

Just the other day, randomly, a water droplet sort of sound has been playing. Sometimes is 1 drop and other times it's 2 to 3. It's usually every maybe, 10-15 minutes or so. It's driving me crazy and I've been researching and researching but no answers.

We don't have Pest Patrol and I don't have any background programs running that I know of that make this noise. The only way to turn it off is to mute the computer which is problematic because silence just isn't my thing. I've also ran a full system scan and it found nothing, I don't believe it's a virus anyway.

Willing to listen to any and all advice.

Discussion is locked

16 Posts
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Clarification Request
That sounds like
by itsdigger Oct 30, 2013 8:01AM PDT

white noise or background sounds from a media player. The media player I use has a setting for Rain It plays in between tracks. Maybe check your start program and see what you have checked at start up ....Digger

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excuse me
by itsdigger Oct 30, 2013 8:08AM PDT

it doesn't play in between tracks, it just plays when the music is paused

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Answer
Windows XP water droplet noise???
by Oct 29, 2013 10:18AM PDT

As you can 'mute' the sound, it is obviously electrical and not mechanical. Try opening Task Manager (right click bottom tool-bar and choose same from menu), maximise it, choose 'Processes' tab and click top of CPU column (possibly twice) so that maximum CPU usage is at the top. Now be very patient (for 10-15 minutes), sit and look at what processes pop up at (or near) the top of the column.

You may just be lucky and see what it is - then you can either switch it off or disable it. I'm guessing it's just an annoying, but possibly harmless, bug of some sort. Or you may spot something straight away, from the list of running processes.

Have you run Malwarebytes - this often finds the odd bug that some AVs leave behind. Best of luck - and please let us all know what it is if you find it.

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Further to that.
by Dafydd Oct 29, 2013 10:27AM PDT

Have you tried going to control panel sound schemes and checking no sounds.

Dafydd.

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...
by ZeAtomik Oct 30, 2013 7:51AM PDT

Hmmmm, I watched it like a hawk and nothing really caught my eye besides the System Idle Process, other than that, FireFox is the highest thing.

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Do you have.
by Dafydd Oct 30, 2013 8:08AM PDT

Pest patrol or some other cookie cruncher? theae sometimes use this sound to indicate a cookie has been crunched.

Dafydd.

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No
by ZeAtomik Oct 31, 2013 7:49AM PDT

Not that I know of.

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Have you...
by Dafydd Oct 31, 2013 7:59AM PDT

...tried ( I'm assuming it's IE ) resetting IE or running it with addons disabled?

Dafydd.

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Nope
by ZeAtomik Nov 1, 2013 8:40AM PDT

because I don't use IE, only Firefox and Chrome. I've closed either or and as long as one of the window's open it'll make the noise.

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Many causes. Too many.
by r. proffitt Forum moderator Oct 30, 2013 8:21AM PDT
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I've been through that thread
by ZeAtomik Nov 1, 2013 8:41AM PDT

Tried pretty much all of it and came up with nothing.

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OK. I'm stumped.
by Dafydd Nov 1, 2013 9:32AM PDT

All I can offer now is. Do you have the restore media or a backup image to restore from?
Or try a system restore to before it happened.

Dafydd.

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Oddly enough...
by ZeAtomik Nov 2, 2013 7:54AM PDT

After I restarted my computer, I noticed it wasn't making the noise anymore. I think it may have stopped sometime before then but I'm not complaining. Thanks for the suggestions anyways.

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Did you search all of your PC for sound files?
by skycatcher Nov 1, 2013 10:24AM PDT

There must be some *.wav files somewhere on your machine.

Open Windows Explorer, right-click on Program Files and Search for *.wav - Now do the same with the Windows folder. Not sure where else wav files would be stored...

I never use them, all my sound schemes are turned off.

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Answer
Let's say it's some app.
by Forum moderator Nov 1, 2013 12:09PM PDT

I see most of the usual is covered but let's take it up a notch. Beware we are going to the deep end so get out the water wings.

Go get HIJACKTHIS and produce a report.

Now my question to you is this. Do you know what every item in the report is?
And why not research each item?
Bob

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Answer
Have you....
by Nov 2, 2013 3:11AM PDT

OK, just to rule some things out, have you run scans with UPDATED AV (which one?), Updated MBAM and Updated Spybot Search and Destroy??? If not, I strongly suggest that you do so in Safe Mode.

The fact that you can silence the sound by muting the volume says that there is a software - good or malicious - causing the problem. The $64,000 question is, "Which one?". Find that and either get into its settings to silence the sound or if you don't want/need the program get rid of it. Use Revo Uninstaller (Free version will suffice) in Advanced mode for this. It's a LOT more thorough than the native uninstaller in XP.

I hope this helps in some way. Happy

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