Lound Ringing/pulse/alarm from desktop

[Jedi Ninja]

Is the computer booting up at all. Do you get an initial screen, does it load windows, are there any error message on screen etc.?

Also, you are saying it's a single tone, not a repeating beeping sound?

[Flash Walken]

Single, consistent tone.

I haven't plugged it in to see if there is anything showing up on the monitor. I usually turn it off pretty quick because the noise is so annoying.

[Hanni]

When you took it apart did you take the ram out and clean it? If not maybe try reseating it. It is a tone? Like it's coming from the internal speaker. If it's not coming from the speaker maybe a fan bearing is shot, but that's just a complete stab in the dark.

[photon]

Yeah, as I mentioned before some motherboards will beep if there's no RAM (or if the ram is faulty so it can't see it), try either 1 stick of RAM at a time, or even just turning it on with no RAM in it to see if you get the same beep.

And how about the video card, is it built into the motherboard? Or is it an addin one? If it's an addin one, what model? Does it require an extra power cable?

[Flash Walken]

Well, I'm on the computer now.

I don't know what happened, but after dis-assembling the video card and then re-attaching everything, things just seemed to work.

Anyway, thanks everyone for the help. If it happens again, the video will definitely be the first thing I look at.

[photon]

I had one combination of case and motherboard once that when put together the video card didn't always fit in properly, I had to fiddle with it, usually re-seating it 3-4 times to get it to work, so who knows

[Hack&Lube]

If you ever get that sound again, just make a recording of it for us.