According to your system specs, you are running Windows XP.

When shutting down into Standby mode, your data is stored in RAM so that it can recover quickly. The power has been cut to your hard drive and monitor as it enters a low power state, but it is still on. Sometimes there are issues waking up the peripherals (driver issues) and sometimes there are issues if you have Windows Automatic Updates enabled, etc. I never use that mode or the Hibernate mode. I never have the monitor or hard drive shut off either. I have always shut down the computer completely. I am also using a KVM switch that switches between four computers using a common keyboard, monitor, and mouse.

John

John, what would you say to the following, which I have restated ad naseum.

The Pc got switched off.

The PCs power cord was detached.

This IS a dead PC. There is no drivers loaded anywhere. Apart from it being nailed to it's perch, this is starting to sound like a Monty Python dead parrot sketch. I could THEN plug in the power cord and I get this noise. Where, in everything that's Faraday, would these non existent non loaded Drivers be hiding???

Cheers

Grazie

John, what would you say to the following, which I have restated ad naseum.
==========================
OK.............sorry. You said Standby.

Then Standby was the incorrect term.. I just took it literally.
The unit was OFF, not on Standby. Let me go back and read it all.

John

EDIT: OK. I get it now. My bet would be on a power button issue. Pull the two-pin power switch connector off the motherboard and see if the noise goes away. If it does, bad contacts on the button end or an issue at the other end of the twin cable with it's two-pin connection on the motherboard. Contact cleaner on the button switch (from the inside) would be the second thing after checking the two-pin connector on the motherboard. If not that, the Realtek audio chip on the motherboard is probably picking up EMI from the power supply. You might want to turn off the onboard audio in the BIOS as a precaution.

Then Standby was the incorrect term.. I just took it literally.Sorry Grazie, this was MY fault: I was the one who told you to quit using "off" and instead use "standby." What I failed to realize is that "standby," as John correctly notes, is also used to describe the state that Windows creates when it keeps the RAM alive when you choose the "standby" option when shutting down. However, if you select the "turn off" option, the point I tried to get across (and that Bob kept making as well) is that it really doesn't completely remove power from your PC just the same as pressing the "off" switch on your TV set doesn't completely remove power. In both cases, some of the circuitry is still powered so that the beast can be restarted using a "remote" button, such as the front panel power switch on the PC (or network "wake up" command, etc.).

So, I'm afraid that I inadvertently "set you up." Sorry 'bout that.

What more could I have said?

Here is a PC with nothing attached to it save a POWER cord and a set of cans to monitor the hideous noise I was getting. I could pull out the cord and reinsert it and I'd get this sound again.

When unplugged, even I know that the PC has no electricity going to it, that when I reinsert the power cord the sound comes back, immediately. I hadn't booted-up the PC, just plugged it back to the mains.

So, it would appear that neither of you realised the importance of what I was saying? Truly frustrating for me, and not a little annoying to boot. I think we've all learnt something through this process.

As to switching off in BIOS I've been assured that this would have been taken care of during installation.

Cheers Guys,

Grazie

So, it would appear that neither of you realised the importance of what I was saying? Truly frustrating for me, and not a little annoying to boot. I think we've all learnt something through this process.Well, that seems a little harsh. Actually most of us, including me, realized exactly what you were saying about the power switch and the state of power to the computer, and tried to give advice based on our correct understanding, including the advice which finally worked for you, namely that you should use a plug-in audio card.

I just re-read my posts, and I gave you exactly the correctly advice from the get-go, as did others.

I spent more than a little time on this, and don't like having my advice classified as "annoying," especially when it was correct (except for suggesting using the term "standby").

I think Grazie understood quite well what was likely - once everyone here realized that his PC was powered off, and the fact that it was an internal sound device. At that point (the 90%+ confidence level point) some of the additional testing was starting to look superfluous.

The right thing to do was simply to go and get a new external audio card rather than invest more time (which is money) into it.

It could very easily be the power supply. If all Grazie does is plug in the power cord, and the PC is still off, and he hears noise - the odds are on the power supply. There should be no power going to the sound card.

If all Grazie does is plug in the power cord, and the PC is still off, and he hears noise - the odds are on the power supply.

For that scenario to be likely true - he'd have a much more immediate problem to deal with first. If the power supply starts failing, all sorts of bad things happen, including failing to boot. That wasn't the case.

Sometimes drivers do get corrupted - but the usual case is no sound output. Were a driver to produce sound when not directed to do so - you should be able to count the seconds one one hand until the BSOD appears. No case here either.


I wouldn't unilaterally rule out a power supply issue, it's just that there's little in the way of correlating symptoms so far.

Also, if it were the power supply, one would assume that the noise would be in both channels.

What more could I have said?
===================================================
Even though you plugged and unplugged the cord from the back of the power supply you had the power switch (the thing you called the "isolator") ON. The push button sends a 5-volt signal to the power supply to tell it when to turn on. The power supply also has a circuit that supplies 5 volts, called VSB for "voltage standby " even when it is officially "OFF", so that the button works. And that's not all that is "ON"

I have two computers with motherboards that clearly demonstrate this. They have lights on the motherboard. Turn off the power supply switch and the lights go off. Turn on the power supply switch and the lights go on. If I leave the switch in the ON position and plug and unplug the cord from the wall the light's will go on and off same way. That is because some power is being supplied to the motherboard (5 volt logic circuits.) all the time when the switch is turned ON and the computer is just sitting there. It is NOT, however, supplying power to the PCI slots where your new sound card lies.

Today's power supplies use "switching" technology (to reduce the weight) to convert 50 Hz (in your country) to a higher frequency. That will enable a smaller (and lighter) transformer to "step-down" 220 volts (in Britain) to smaller voltages. It also allows rectifier circuits (that convert AC to to the DC the computer needs) to be regulated easier and more accurately. A Switching Regulator is used. A switching circuit that operates in a closed loop system to regulate the power supply output. Those regulated DC voltages that are present on the motherboard as soon as the cord is plugged in with the power supply switch in the ON position require that the high frequency circuit be active. That means EMI is being emitted the extent of which is determined by the quality of the power supply design and / or whether or not the input EMI filter and other parts of that circuit are working properly. In some cases, EMI can be affected by added load capacitance. It can even be caused by using a power cable that is too long or by using an extension cord or cheap power strip in conjunction with it, depending upon the quality of the power supply.

To your second point. If someone told you that the installation software for your new sound card turns off the motherboard sound IN THE BIOS, that's a new one for me. I don't see how that is possible. AFAIK the sound card's installation software can only turn it off in the Windows environment. Now if simply inserting the sound card in the PCI slot turns off the onboard sound in the BIOS, I have never had a motherboard with a BIOS that did that either.

John

John, thanks.

Your first point tells me how it is. Good to know! Translating that to my situ, I wouldn't have a clue.

To your second point, which I was told in the shop, and have to take on trust from the assistant, AND until I return there and ask your observation, which, how would be how would a Windows enviro make changes to the BIOS? Is that it? Also to have them clarify this business of card insert and switch on changes BIOS, I'd need to have confirmed. But this WAS the reaction I got when I carried, I think it was Bob's comment or yours, that I would need to rummage around in the BIOS manually, the empathic response was, NO need to do it. What can I say?

But here I stand, or rather seated, working away like a contented editor, beavering away at the my own captured BBC program's footage. Cooo their sound signal to my camera is well good!

Cheers

Grazie

Grazie,

I n terms of a potential power button issue that I mentioned above. You can probably forget about it now that the noise problem is gone. Down the road, there are two symptoms that would point to it that might occur if there is an issue with that button.
If it get's stuck in the off position the computer won't bot. If it get's stuck in the on position it will keep restarting when you issue the Shut Down command from Windows. Just so you know what to do if that happens. I could be completely wrong about the switch contacts anyway.

In terms of the power supply. Because of the way they are designed these days (as I described above to provide high power with reduced weight) they don't last as long as the older (heavier) ones did. You may have to change that down the road.

Now get back to that BBC project. It's more rewarding and much more important. Let us know how it went in that other thread.

John

A quick Google reveals that Yes, installing the new sound card should disable the one on the mobo. If it doesn't then it can be selected via Control Panel. Failing all that it can also be disabled via the BIOS.

As far as I know Windows can also support multiple sound cards and multiple ways to talk to the one sound card. In Vegas you can select which physical or logical device things get connected to hence my previous tip about having a look see what you're talking too.

Bob.

A quick Google reveals that Yes, installing the new sound card should disable the one on the mobo. If it doesn't then it can be selected via Control Panel. Failing all that it can also be disabled via the BIOS.
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The question goes back to a suggestion I made to Grazie above that I thought it would be a good idea that he disable the onboard sound in the BIOS as a precaution now that he installed a sound card. Grazie said that he was under the impression that this was done by the installation. My response was that the sound card installation software disables it in Windows, but that I didn't think the software nor simply inserting the card in the slot disables it in the BIOS. None of mine do that. Unless his motherboard has a separate BIOS for the sound. That would show up in the boot screens (if viewing those screens is enabled during bootup).

John

Most unusual if not impossible for a soundcard installation to disable the onboard soundcard in BIOS; Windows will support multiple soundcards with few limitations (e.g. does not support more than 256 total ASIO streams....); Earlier I mentioned disabling onboard sound in BIOS as that conveniently makes it invisible in all Windows & application menus..... thus most applications should automatically use the newer card without user intervention.

So why, chaps, when I now try and access the old RealTek HD MoBo audio card through the Windows Control, it is dead? I haven't gone into the BIOS to disable it. How do you suggest that this has happened?

Cheers

Grazie

"So why, chaps, when I now try and access the old RealTek HD MoBo audio card through the Windows Control, it is dead?"That's because it no longer has a pit to hiss in [heh, heh].

...Jerry

So why, chaps, when I now try and access the old RealTek HD MoBo audio card through the Windows Control, it is dead? I haven't gone into the BIOS to disable it. How do you suggest that this has happened?
===============================
The installation software for the sound card disabled the onboard audio driver in Windows. This is normal.

John

So why, chaps, when I now try and access the old RealTek HD MoBo audio card through the Windows Control, it is dead?

It is still visible to Windows because you didn't disable it in BIOS; but it appears dead to Windows because the driver software has been removed or disabled. If you disable it in BIOS then Windows will never see it. Can't spell it out more clearly than that!