My computer has recently started whining really loudly, I'm not sure what is causing it. Can anyone advise me on what might be causing this sound? It started off sort of quiet, but now it's starting to get really loud.
Back to top

Hi Crystal, it sounds to me like one of the internal fans in your computer is failing, that kind of whine is usually caused by a fan that is dying. The best thing to do is open the computer up, take a tube of some sort, and try to localize the precise source of the whine by using the tube as a sort of stethoscope.

Because of how sound works, high pitched whines are very difficult to pinpoint, your computer has between 2 and 5 or 6 fans in it, depending on what type it is.

There is probably one fan directly inside the power supply, that's facing the back of the pc usually, top of the box, with a wire type grill over it. Then the processor itself has a fan on it, that's usually towards one side, top usually in relation to the power supply of the main motherboard, that fan will be ontop of a silvery heat sink (in most cases, sometimes that whole assembly is hidden from view, on Dells for example it's got a big plastic funnel on top of it.

Then the case often has some fans, one in front, sometimes one in back.

On higher end motherboards, sometimes there is one more tiny little fan ontop of a smaller heatsink, it's about 1/3 the size of the CPU fan, and on higher end video cards, there can be a fan on their graphics processor.

You'll need to figure out exactly which fan it is that is failing, if it's the power supply, cpu, or graphics card fan, you need to get that replaced as soon as possible, since if any one of those fails, the whole system can fail.

A modern CPU has only a few seconds to live after its cooling fan fails, it will burn out immediately, same for the graphics processor fan.

It's also possible that a harddrive is failing, although that sound is usually more metallic in nature, the hard drive spins faster than the cooling fans, but that's worth checking out too.
Back to top

Thanks for the advice, I took the computer to a local computer shop, I thought it was the cpu fan, but they discovered that it was the graphics card processor fan. Since that card is still under warranty I called the place I got it, crucial.com, and they are sending me a replacement, when I get it I just have to send back the broken unit.

That's pretty good service, I can see why crucial is recommended so often.

Thanks for the help, Crystal
Back to top