Michael, The noise could be caused by a bad cooling fan bearing. I had a Dell laptop that went through no less than three of these fans over seven years. Each failure was predicated by a great deal of noise, then the machine would get hot and start acting funny. The good news is that the cooling assembly was cheap ($30) and easy (for me) to replace. You may want to explore getting a replacement part from Sony, if you were planning on ditching your laptop just because of the noise. Best, Cody -----Original Message----- From: hidden-discuss-bounces at lists.hidden-tech.net [mailto:hidden-discuss-bounces at lists.hidden-tech.net] On Behalf Of Michael McIntosh Sent: Friday, March 17, 2006 1:05 AM To: Hidden Tech Subject: [Hidden-tech] Anyone in the area have equipment for measuring PCnoise levels? ** Be a Good Dobee and help the group, you must be counted to post . ** Fill out the survey/skills inventory in the member's area. Hello Folks, My current "desktop replacement" laptop that I use extensively for work and occasionally for gaming generates a LOT of noise. The amount of noise it generates is having a negative impact on the mental health of both my wife and I since I work from home and the noise is a constant irritation. There is always a collective sigh of relief in our household when the laptop is finally turned off. Unfortunately, being the techie that I am, it doesn't get turned off too often. I am currently investigating building a high-performance PC that runs very quietly, preferably something that generates less than 25 dB of noise from ~2 feet away. I have found some articles that discuss how I can build a quiet desktop PC (such as http://tinyurl.com/faota) or the differences between typical noise levels (http://tinyurl.com/2q7vz). For sake of comparison, I need to determine the amount of noise my current laptop generates and I do not have the equipment to do so. I've considered buying sound level measuring equipment for the task, but realistically I'd only probably use it a couple times before it would be shelved and begin to collect dust. I suspect that my current system generates around 40 dB worth of noise when "idle" and as much as 60 dB when running a modern computer game or playing a DVD movie. If someone has or can direct me to someone who has sound level measuring equipment that I could borrow, I'd greatly appreciate it. Then I'd have a better idea of how much effort is needed to restore peace and quiet to our home again. (er, 7 month old daughter not withstanding) :) Thank you for your time. :) -Michael McIntosh PS: My laptop is a Sony Vaio PCG-K25. Its a nice machines that has a beautiful display and works very well despite the noise/heat problems. _______________________________________________ Hidden-discuss mailing list - home page: http://www.hidden-tech.net Hidden-discuss at lists.hidden-tech.net You are receiving this because you are on the Hidden-Tech Discussion list. If you would like to change your list preferences, Go to the Members page on the Hidden Tech Web site. http://www.hidden-tech.net/members