I've finally found what has been causing my ears to ring!

ANJ89 · 11 Jul 2021 at 18:09

I've been struggling badly with my new PC build and at my wits end, it was making me wake up with horrendous headaches and my ears would ring all day.

I even went to the doctors, got blood tests and an ECG and they couldn't find anything wrong with me.

I tried swapping the PSU, GPU and monitor but nothing improved it. I was beginning to wonder if I had an underlying health problem.

Until someone in the office told me my PC sounded like a whining air conditioning unit, I had no idea what they were referring to, then I realised I could almost hear it, it was my Lian Li Galahad AIO.

One of the fans is causing a high pitched whine which goes away when I stop the fan. Interesting not instantly, so maybe it is the motor.

You can just about hear it in this video:

This is the only fan that does this.

I bought it in March 2021, would Overclockers RMA for something like this?

Thanks

mickyflinn · 11 Jul 2021 at 18:51

Send ot back if you think theres a problem

chili · 11 Jul 2021 at 21:52

unable to hear anything myself in your video, must confess i have tinnitus and less than perfect hearing

darael · 11 Jul 2021 at 22:22

chili said:
unable to hear anything myself in your video

I couldn't either, so I just put it down to my tinnitus.

darael · 11 Jul 2021 at 22:35

Just extracted the audio from the YouTube video and Audacity does show something between 4.75k and 4.8k on the spectrogram. Even with full volume I still couldn't hear it, even though I could see it coming and going on the spectrogram. :confused:

ANJ89 · 11 Jul 2021 at 22:35

darael said:
I couldn't either, so I just put it down to my tinnitus.

I originally did put it down to Tinnitus, thankfully it immediately stops when the fan stops so it isn’t tinnitus.

It seems some people can hear it and some can’t, it isn’t easily noticeable in that video.

t31os · 11 Jul 2021 at 22:36

It's subtle, but i can a hear difference (i also have tinnitus and not especially great hearing), what i'm noticing might just be standard fan noise and i might be missing something (the ability to hear certain sound frequencies diminishes with age).

ANJ89 · 11 Jul 2021 at 22:37

darael said:
Just extracted the audio from the YouTube video and Audacity does show something between 4.75k and 4.8k on the spectrogram. Even with full volume I still couldn't hear it, even though I could see it coming and going on the spectrogram.

Thanks for taking the time to do that. I have very sensitive hearing unfortunately, those cat deterrent things that people put in their garden really irritate my ears.

ANJ89 · 12 Jul 2021 at 09:38

t31os said:
It's subtle, but i can a hear difference (i also have tinnitus and not especially great hearing), what i'm noticing might just be standard fan noise and i might be missing something (the ability to hear certain sound frequencies diminishes with age).

The best way to hear it is to turn your volume right up and you will notice it when the fan stops and starts again. It is a lot louder in person.

phil-k · 12 Jul 2021 at 09:45

Can't hear anything other than the normal fan noise, although I do have tinnitus which seems to be wide spread on here

Angelwolf · 12 Jul 2021 at 10:28

Age plays a factor in being able to hear frequencies like that. The older you are, the less likely you are to hear it - you can get apps on your phone to try it out, too.

Glad you found the cause, that must have been very frustrating!

EsaT · 12 Jul 2021 at 13:43

Spectrum analysis shows clear narrowband ~4,78 kHz noise with only ~30Hz variation.

Here's toy to pick sounds apart.
https://www.qsl.net/dl4yhf/spectra1.html
Just use "What U Hear" loop back as source/input.

Puzzled · 13 Jul 2021 at 12:30

Its subtle but the fan you stop does a higher pitch over the general fan noise.

I can sympathise though as I find high pitched electronics extremely annoying, its normally dodgy power adaptors for me that end up being the culprit. Turn them off and the high pitch squealing goes away.

ANJ89 · 13 Jul 2021 at 13:27

Puzzled said:
Its subtle but the fan you stop does a higher pitch over the general fan noise.

I can sympathise though as I find high pitched electronics extremely annoying, its normally dodgy power adaptors for me that end up being the culprit. Turn them off and the high pitch squealing goes away.

thanks. Do you mean the PSU or the actual power cable?

Puzzled · 13 Jul 2021 at 14:51

ANJ89 said:
thanks. Do you mean the PSU or the actual power cable?

No those little plug in power adaptors / transformer things that most devices need now. You occasionally get dodgy ones that give off a high pitched whine. Although you do get PSU's that do it, tbh I think most electronics can do it, coil whine on gfx cards for example.

Not to the extent where I'd be offered an ECG mind. Just gets blamed on my tinnitus.

LuckyBenski · 13 Jul 2021 at 18:57

Puzzled said:
Its subtle but the fan you stop does a higher pitch over the general fan noise.

I can sympathise though as I find high pitched electronics extremely annoying, its normally dodgy power adaptors for me that end up being the culprit. Turn them off and the high pitch squealing goes away.

This really gets me. It's often when not under load - my phone chargers squeal until I plug something into them.

Also the charger brick AND the laptop itself for my work computer. A Microsoft Surface Laptop 2 no less. No hard drive but I can hear the VRMs singing based on the CPU load. Drives me mad.