Does the Arecibo BPS make chirping sounds?
29 Apr 2009 22:37:27 UTC
Topic 194323
(moderation:
Does the Arecibo BPS make chirping sounds?
On my Vista system I could swear that it does.
If so it would be the 1st distributed computing program to use the audio subsystem -- technically with BOINC there is nothing to prevent this.
Does the Arecibo BPS make chirping sounds?
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Hi!
Not that we know of. It shouldn't make any sounds at all.
This also might be quiet annoying for the users - at least I prefer my computer not to produce any unwanted sounds.
Cheers,
Ben
Einstein@Home Project
There are several components
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There are several components of a computing system which can produce audible sound that is somehow related to computation (besides the intended sound system).
Besides the obvious ones:
1. disk access sounds.
2. fan speed variation in response to varying thermal load
The power subsystem which converts intermediate voltage near the CPU to the particular requirements of the CPU is notorious in some implementations for generating load-related audible sound. I think the offending specific components may be inductors, but am not sure on that.
In any case, the rest of us with different systems are unlikely to share your particular experience. I've heard nothing new on my systems. That does not mean you don't.
Have you tried pausing the code, perhaps by using "suspend project" in BOINC manager, to check that the sound you hear indeed starts and stops repeatably with this code? A slightly better check would be to have another BOINC project queued up (SETI, say), so that you could switch back and forth between projects, each of which would generate near 100% CPU load, but presumably differ in whatever way is giving your effect. If you can turn the sound on and off by rapid project switches using the suspend mechanism, I'd say you have a demonstrated association, though not a mechanism diagnosis.
Noooooo, the OP is right. I
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Noooooo, the OP is right. I hear it too and only when crunching Einstein tasks. It's definitely coming out of the speakers. When I turn the speakers off the sound stops. When I turn speakers on the sound resumes. The volume rises and falls when I play with the volume control.
I don't hear it on XP, I don't have Vista and never will, I do hear it on 2 of my Linux boxes that run Fedora 5 but not on the one that runs Fedora 10. I would say it's more like a crow's "caw, caw, caw" than a chirp. When the task finishes I hear one distinct sigh, as if it's relaxing after a tough job.
BOINC FAQ Service
Official BOINC wiki
Installing BOINC on Linux
RE: Noooooo, the OP is
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Does the sound repeatably begin/end coincident with task suspend/resume, as I suggested be checked below?
As with the power supply acoustic sounds, it is not only possible but likely for PC sound systems to pick up electrical noise from other sources in the box. That is not a good thing, but it is common. I can remember with some of my older systems getting obvious sonic signatures coming out the sound port from activity on the graphics card/monitor combination.
RE: RE: Noooooo, the OP
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Yes, and only with Einstein tasks. None of my other projects do it. I am surprised only the OP and I can hear it.
I rather like it to tell the truth. It has provided a heightened user experience for me and provided an organic holistic facet to crunching. I've always thought the graphics were a bad waste of good CPU cycles but not so with the bird noises. If I close my eyes and listen to the crow in the Einstein tasks I see myself in a sunny, green, woody glenn. With a brook running through it. A babbling brook. The bouquet of a thousand wild flowers in bloom floats on the air. Bunny rabbits frolic in the grass. Oh look, there's Bambi!! Well done Einstein devs!
Could we get an option to select from a number of different birds... meadowlark and nightingale would be nice too though I don't find them quite as lovely as the crow. Does anybody else have any requests?
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Official BOINC wiki
Installing BOINC on Linux
When we had meetings in the
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When we had meetings in the room with the servers I used to shock the project manager by telling him the exact moment when the system had crashed.
He never could figure it out, thought it was magic.
It was rather simple actually, it was the sounds of the disk drives ... when the system was working normally they made a certain rhythmic sound. Pattern changed, system dying ...
Old systems techs used to use a pair of D to A converters on the address lines to display on the xy axis of an o-scope the pattern of operation and you could tell when the system "panicked" because the patterns would not be "right" ...
i am reminded of when i got
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i am reminded of when i got this new system case, my sterio was about 2 feet from the system. if i left the "door" (covers the drive bays) open, the sterio would pick up all hard drive activity, it was rather interesting to run a defrag like that.
seeing without seeing is something the blind learn to do, and seeing beyond vision can be a gift.
I've had one mystery chirp
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I've had one mystery chirp come out of my speakers this morning while an ABP was running. Sounded similar to the ones in the audio blackhole hutner game that was linked here a few months ago.
It's gone now, but my XP2600+
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It's gone now, but my XP2600+ Win32 system was making those chirping sounds on the speakers during the first hour or so of crunching the WU.
Sounded more like a cricket to me.
[edit]Well, maybe not gone. Project task switch for now w/Malaria so E@H isn't crunching actively on that system at the moment.[/edit]
Seti Classic Final Total: 11446 WU.
RE: It's gone now, but my
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I've always noted the sounds of these projects since I started SETI 10 yrs ago, with a portable radio sat next to the PC. SETI 1 and 2 could hear the individual sets of 8 FFTs like hammering nails, the different sizes running at different speeds.
S5R4 and 5 make long drawn-out sad sighs, different numbers of sighs per checkpoint depending on the parameters of the work.
ABPS 305 seems to go pip-pip-pip in sets of three but I cant hear it on the speaker or from the PC.