Dell Inspiron Making God Awful Noise

By Gerowen
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Grand Master

Gerowen

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I bought my wife a new Dell Inspiron touch-screen laptop a few months back to do some light gaming and general working on.  It has no optical drive whatsoever, but if you leave it on for extended periods of time, for whatever reason it makes this terrible noise that sounds like it's trying to spin up a CD drive, even though it doesn't have one.  It will pulse 5 or 6 times, loud enough that I can hear it from across the room.  It's got good ventilation, it spends most of its time folded up and sitting on a wire rack behind the television (the wire rack is intended to elevate it above the shelf for increased air ventilation).  Speccy and Crystal Disk Info both say the hard drive is fine, and I've ran CPU benchmarks to make the fan kick on and it doesn't make that sound.  Performance doesn't seem to take a hit if you're playing a game when it does it.

 

It's doing it every couple of minutes right now; I'll try to capture it on video.  Anybody have any idea what it could be?

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Mindovermaster Moderator

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I'd RMA that. It really shouldn't be doing that. That might be your hard drive sound. Did you pinpoint where the beeping happens?

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If it has been a few months since bought, you can get it fixed under the warranty. 

 

Take it to the store where you got it from and they will take care of it. I mean the computer tech shop inside the store. Such as Best Buy.. 

 

If not, contact Dell and go from there.  If bought from Dell online, contact them.

 

 

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Gerowen

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Just now, xendrome said:

Go straight through dell support, they will take care of it. http://www.dell.com/support/incidents-online/us/en/19/contactus/Dynamic

I'll give them a call.  I've got a video of it uploading to YouTube at the moment to share here with you guys and with Dell if they want.  Lucky thing most of our personal documents except things we use a lot are already stored on our Debian Linux file server so I shouldn't have to back up a whole lot.

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+E.Worm Jimmy Subscriber¹

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4 minutes ago, Gerowen said:

Here's the noise it's making.

...

sounds like a dot matrix printer printing something.. i would DEFINITELY get it replaced or fix by dell.   maybe a fan is broken and scratching something.

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SoCalRox

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You don't mention which model Inspiron that is, but the three beeps indicates, basically, a system board failure. There are multiple failure points that can cause that to happen. It needs to see a doctor very soon.

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Gerowen

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So I called Dell support last night and let them take control of the machine for a few minutes.  He installed an updated BIOS and an updated firmware for the touch screen itself.  He ran a couple of basic "Dell" diagnostic tests and all of the hardware passed.

 

It hasn't made the noise since then, which is weird as hell that updated firmware could fix it making a physical sound like that.  I've got an e-mail from the guy though with a ticket number so if the issue persists I can get hold of him.  She has been playing Minecraft for an hour or so and it hasn't made the noise again, so hopefully that's the end of it.

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SoCalRox

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Gerowin, that is not a hardware sound, it's emitted from a small "speaker" to indicate problems. They tell you what is apparently the issue. And yes, a firmware update can correct a problem if it is a bug causing the system to mistake a condition for an error situation. 

 

I suspect you weren't around in the ancient days of yore when PCs had no speakers other than the ones for the system to beep at you when it was ticked off...

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xendrome

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40 minutes ago, AMPSV said:

http://www.dell.com/support/article/nz/en/nzbsdt1/SLN293445

 

9 minutes ago, SoCalRox said:

Gerowin, that is not a hardware sound, it's emitted from a small "speaker" to indicate problems. They tell you what is apparently the issue. And yes, a firmware update can correct a problem if it is a bug causing the system to mistake a condition for an error situation. 

 

I suspect you weren't around in the ancient days of yore when PCs had no speakers other than the ones for the system to beep at you when it was ticked off...

Yeah sorry guys, those aren't beep codes. Those are only going to be triggered pre BIOS/UEFI boot.

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Gerowen

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1 hour ago, SoCalRox said:

Gerowin, that is not a hardware sound, it's emitted from a small "speaker" to indicate problems. They tell you what is apparently the issue. And yes, a firmware update can correct a problem if it is a bug causing the system to mistake a condition for an error situation. 

 

I suspect you weren't around in the ancient days of yore when PCs had no speakers other than the ones for the system to beep at you when it was ticked off...

I remember I had a PC with one built in that was used to make the beeps for old DOS games when I was a little kid, but I always thought that BIOS/UEFI error beeps would occur during POST and not while the system was already running and being used, so that's why it was weird to me.

 

However, after somebody mentioned it, I re-watched my own video and it is a series of 3 beeps repeated a couple of times.

 

Anyway, the issue seems to have been resolved with a firmware update, so hopefully it's all g2g.  I learned something new, :-)

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SoCalRox

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On 11/19/2016 at 3:07 PM, Gerowen said:

I remember I had a PC with one built in that was used to make the beeps for old DOS games when I was a little kid, but I always thought that BIOS/UEFI error beeps would occur during POST and not while the system was already running and being used, so that's why it was weird to me.

 

However, after somebody mentioned it, I re-watched my own video and it is a series of 3 beeps repeated a couple of times.

 

Anyway, the issue seems to have been resolved with a firmware update, so hopefully it's all g2g.  I learned something new, :-)

True, they usually occur during POST, but I have had a couple of PCs that would belch out the beeps if a hardware issue cropped up while running.

 

Have you run MEMTEST? http://www.memtest86.com Not a great likelihood of finding out if that's the solution, but it never hurts.

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Mindovermaster Moderator

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44 minutes ago, SoCalRox said:

True, they usually occur during POST, but I have had a couple of PCs that would belch out the beeps if a hardware issue cropped up while running.

 

Have you run MEMTEST? http://www.memtest86.com Not a great likelihood of finding out if that's the solution, but it never hurts.

Why would MemTest help? I don't think RAM is his issue.

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Mindovermaster Moderator

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17 minutes ago, SoCalRox said:

Mind, it likely is not. But it is an easy starting point, and is often a failure point.

If it was a RAM fault, it would either beep at startup, or fail to work. I.E. system lockups.

 

This does not seem to be his issue. Yes, it will knock down a pin, but I highly doubt that it is his issue here.

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19 minutes ago, SoCalRox said:

Mind, it likely is not. But it is an easy starting point, and is often a failure point.

The computer was running fine.. as you see the OP stated that his wife was playing a game. 

 

Which means something was making noise while she was playing a game on the PC..    

 

I really doubt it was the RAM.

 

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Gerowen

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Just got a call back for the e-mail I sent on Friday (They're closed on weekends I guess).  They're going to e-mail me a shipping label in order to send it back for repair or replacement.

 

Just going to back up her personal documents then do a factory reset and make sure all her files are gone before mailing it out.

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Mindovermaster Moderator

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45 minutes ago, Gerowen said:

Just going to back up her personal documents then do a factory reset and make sure all her files are gone before mailing it out.

That include pron at all? :rofl:

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T3X4S

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Well that sucks you have to send in a new laptop.  I didnt listen closely to the noise, but my 1st thought was "well if its making a noise, there has to be movement - has to be a fan" but if it is coming out of the speaker as someone suggested - then possibly interference ?  I dont know.

Give them hell @ Dell support - dont let them jerk you around - demand a replacement & fast.  You need to tell them the truth that your wife was needing that to do a study abroad for her PhD and this has really caused problems for you - :D

 

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jnelsoninjax

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On 11/21/2016 at 7:57 PM, Mindovermaster said:

That include pron at all? :rofl:

Isn't that a given? :rofl:

Also since he's in Kentucky, that would include his family recipe for Moonshine as well! :D 

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