High Pitched squeal sound from CPU area!!

[randle]

I was wondering whether you could help me out with a problem i have with my home computer!!

 

I get a high pitched squealing sound that fluctuates in pitch and volume that occurs only at certain times ie. When i open a splash screen for a game and then change the focus to a browser window. This will then stop when i change the focus back. Also when i load up another game this will start a couple of minutes into it but if i pause this then alt-tab to the desktop, the sound will stop once again. It sounds like it should be something a harddrive would do when on it's last legs as i thought it was relating to when the harddrive was being accessed by applications but have recently replaced the harddrive and also had my ear up against it and know this is not coming from there.

 

I have had my ear up against all components and i can definately say it's NOT coming from

 

PSU

Harddrive(s)

Graphics cards

Any fans - Case cooling, northbridge, CPU, PSU or GPU (I have stopped each of these individually)

Drives (CD/DVD or floppy)

Monitor

 

This is not coming from the speakers so isn't sound card orientated either.

 

It seems to be coming from around the processor area. I have googled this alot and people were mentioning about the chokes (Circular ceramic component with copper rings around it. See here) being loose that can cause this sound and that you can use some non conductive glue to stop this but i have tried touching these with a pencil to see if the sound stops which it doesn't although the intensity of the sound does seem to increase when more pressure is applied to these but i cannot get the sound to stop in this way so maybe this could be linked!! I also haven't removed the CPU heatsink at any time.

 

None of the capasitors look bloated.

 

I reset all BIOS defaults just incase something was overclocking (The system is not overclocked) but this started making the sound here also.

 

It doesn't seem to degrade system performance but this is really starting to annoy me and again i will mention that this doesn't make a sound when doing other things like watching videos, music, email, internet browsing, playing some other games so don't think it can be CPU load.

 

Any ideas/help mucho appretiated as i'm proper stumped

[danIT]

Have you taken everything off the motherboard, cleaned and reseated everything?

[randle]

I'm going to reseat the proccessor tonight. I didn't have any paste for the CPU heatsink so couldn't try previously.

 

Other than that i've reseated everything.

[ChrisC]

Sounds like it could be memory related?

 

Chris

[randle]

If that was the case then surely this would be consistant with every game/app that i opened!! This only happens at certain times and with various games

[ChrisC]

Not necesarily, if the app/game is designed to use specific memory addresses and these are corrupt, or it's particularly memory intensive, this could aggrivate the condition.

 

Chris

[randle]

Ahh right. I'll have a look tonight then

[randle]

I replaced the CPU heatsink and fan which seems to have fixed the problem. The paste looked like it had almost disappeared which is a little strange seeing as i've never had this off since installation. I don't know why i was getting a sound from this though. Anyone?

[gwendes]

I've seen this before on certain motherboards - usually gaming SLI rigs. The noise occurs when the CPU is overheating or the motherboard 'thinks' the CPU is overheating. As you've found, reseating with new thermal paste usually does the trick - unless you've got faulty components.

[randle]

I did notice a 40 degree drop after re-seating this!!!!!!

 

Thankfully this definately fixed the problem as there has been no noise since i have done this.

[StewartKnight]

40 degree drop! Must have been the on-board lobster you heard squeeling!

[randle]

lol must have been.

 

I'm quite suprised it actually lasted as long as it did as i can't remember when it was this quite and ive had the system for nearly 3 years now