Quake3World

Every time I turn my tower on it makes a loud kind of "whirring" noise for the first 60 seconds, the noise then stops completely and all I can hear is the normal sound of the fans. Happens every single time I turn it on, but only if my PC has been off for a while, if I'm simply rebooting it doesn't happen.

Any ideas?

perhaps fans which are temperature regulated going into full speed mode when first starting up, until they have a reference temperate from which to adjust?

Just a guess.

My guess is that the bearings of (probably) your PSU are dirty or worn out and make noise when the fan is cold. When the fan spins for a while the bearings warm up and the noise goes away. Cheap fans often use 'sleeve' bearings, which are a kind of oil bearings that are less noisy than ball bearings but have a shorter lifetime and are less prone to get polluted by dust -- in which case they get noisy.

Sounds like the CD ROM drive ramping up while being identified by Windows on boot.

YourGrandpa wrote:Sounds like the CD ROM drive ramping up while being identified by Windows on boot.

The sound should be reproduced on reboot if it would be the cd/dvd-rom drive.

Oeloe wrote:My guess is that the bearings of (probably) your PSU are dirty or worn out and make noise when the fan is cold. When the fan spins for a while the bearings warm up and the noise goes away. Cheap fans often use 'sleeve' bearings, which are a kind of oil bearings that are less noisy than ball bearings but have a shorter lifetime and are less prone to get polluted by dust -- in which case they get noisy.

hmmm this sounds like the most likely scenario. Assuming this is what is happening, nothing to really worry about then?

Oeloe wrote:

YourGrandpa wrote:Sounds like the CD ROM drive ramping up while being identified by Windows on boot.

The sound should be reproduced on reboot if it would be the cd/dvd-rom drive.

On a reboot, yes. On a restart, no.

Law wrote:

Oeloe wrote:My guess is that the bearings of (probably) your PSU are dirty or worn out and make noise when the fan is cold. When the fan spins for a while the bearings warm up and the noise goes away. Cheap fans often use 'sleeve' bearings, which are a kind of oil bearings that are less noisy than ball bearings but have a shorter lifetime and are less prone to get polluted by dust -- in which case they get noisy.

hmmm this sounds like the most likely scenario. Assuming this is what is happening, nothing to really worry about then?

Push the eject button on the CDROM drive when you boot up. See if the noise still happens when the drive is open.

Ok i'll give it a go next time I restart.

You should only hear a whirring sound from the cd-drive when you got a cd with an off-center label or some other imbalance in it.

YourGrandpa wrote:
On a reboot, yes. On a restart, no.

They are the same thing unless you are talking about powering the system down completely then firing it back up which is a cold boot. :icon6:

He seems to think a reboot is a cold boot per definition.

North Bridge Fan..

Thats where my moneys on

Tried YourGrandpa's recommendation, still made the sound.

SOAPboy wrote:North Bridge Fan..

Thats where my moneys on

aye, especially if its a gigabyte mobo

ToxicBug wrote:aye, especially if its a gigabyte mobo

Yep, had several gigabyte mobos' northbridge fans go, and two of my friends with different gigabyte mobos had their fans go too.

The next time you do a cold boot (when the pc has been turned off for a couple of hours), try to find out if the sound is coming from the PSU or from the northbridge fan (or GPU fan). Listen behind the pc and if it's not coming from there open up the case.

Yep, Do as Oeloe said,

except have the case allready open, and you sitting infront of it..

it will be pritty apparent what Fan is going.

Replace or Lube it and you will be back to the norm.