White Noise can help improve concentration by covering up distracting noise. You basically play white noise in the background when you are working to get rid of distracting sounds in the surrounding.

Studies have shown that white noise can be effectively used to mask office noise.

The Google Chrome extension White Noise adds a white noise player to the web browser. The extension adds a single button to the Chrome browser interface. When you click on it you see the interface of the extension pop up.

Here you can turn on the white noise. When you do the sound starts playing immediately. White noise continues to play for as long as the browser window is open and the sound is not turned off again.

Some users may want to use the volume slider to change the level of volume. The default volume was for instance to loud for my liking, I had to turn it down to reach a level of comfort.

The automatically start when the computer turns on option is a bit misleading. This basically turns on white noise whenever you start the Chrome browser. The setting has probably been designed for Chromebooks where the web app could indeed be turned on when the computer starts.

Google Chrome users can install White Noise from the Chrome Web Store.

How do you cope with distracting noise when working on a computer?

Resting the eyes is obviously still possible, as is light gymnastics. Add ambient music to the experience if you are in the possession of headsets, or a workplace where you can play music without disturbing others.

MoodTurn is a web based application that offers ambient music to “relax and enjoy”. The websites consists of various themes and a player, to play ambient noise as soon as the website is loaded.

moodturn

Available themes include the usual suspects: Rainforest, Storm, Beach, Night, Bonfire, Rain or Garden. Each theme comes with its own distinct ambient noise, and background images that are set to rotate, but offer an option to stop the rotation.

It is a free web service, developed by Ramunas Geciauskas, that provides ambient music and soothing landscapes to help you relax and avoid stress in your daily life.

The site loops music and visuals if you’d prefer to let it play in the background while you work in another window. MoodTurn might be the best way to block out your noisy cubicle neighbor.

The sounds are surprisingly large, each with a playtime of around one hour, which means the site offers roughly ten hours of ambient music to listen to.

Moodturn is perfect for a quick power nap at the work place, or a period of relaxation. The service should be compatible with most modern web browsers.

Pressing F11, or the full screen icon in the player controls, will display the service in full screen mode. (via Shellcity)

That honor would be reserved for the fans of the video card, processor, power unit and case. You might not even hear the noise of the hard drive until you decide to lower down the noise of the other components. Hard drives on the other hand can cause a very high distracting pitching noise.

One possibility to lower the noise of the hard drive would be to use special hard drive cases and other hardware to reduce the noise. Software solutions on the other hand are rare, most are outdated and some even require the creation of a boot disk before they can be run.

WinAAM is a refreshing change. It is compatible with all Windows NT operating systems including the popular Windows XP and Windows Vista. It requires no installation and can be started right after the download has finished.

The software will automatically detect connected IDE or SATA drives and display the status of the Acoustic Management of the device.

The status can either be inactive, low or normal and the noise reduction software displays possible options the acoustic management can be set to in a basic interface. The option to test the changes is given in the application but it was badly implemented. Changing a setting will close the application at the end which means that the application has to be started again to perform the test.

The software can be downloaded at the author’s homepage. The same page contains a version for Mac OS Classic and tips for Mac OS X users.

Noise is an experimental Firefox add-on that adds sound support to Firefox. It is completely event driven meaning that it works by choosing an event, like a click, open tab or download done, and selecting a sound that should be played when the event occurs.

A set of about 20 default events is enabled by default which can be configured to play sounds. In addition to that new events can be added to the Firefox add-on which is unfortunately not as easy as it sounds because of the way new events are added.

Every wave file can be added as a sound in the process. The default beeping noise can also be replaced by other sounds. Users have to use the Events Reference to add events that are not already added by default. It might take a few tries before everything starts working like it should but it’s probably the best way to add sound to Firefox.

The Noise add-on is an experimental Firefox add-on meaning that it cannot be installed from the official Mozilla page without logging in first.

There are not actually that many different noise makers in your computer, the dominant ones are fans and mechanical devices. The article will conclude with three ways to reduce the noise level of your computer starting with free alternatives, fan replacement and noise reduction hardware.

Pc Noise Makers

• Power Supply Fan
• CPU Fan
• GPU Fan
• Case Fans
• Northbridge Fan
• Hard Drives
• CD / DVD Drives

Five of the noise makers in the list are fans while the last two are mechanical devices. It is easy to distinguish between fans and mechanical devices but it becomes a little bit harder to identify the loudest fan in your system.

Open your case and start your computer. Try to identify the loudest fan by simply listening to your computer. Is it possible to identify the noise maker ? If you have troubles spotting the loudest one try the following technique that helps you identify it.

Locate a fan and stop the rotation of that fan for a few seconds by pressing one of your fingers against it. Make sure you do not put your fingers inside the fan but the central area that connects all the rotating blades. If the noise level drops you identified the noise maker. The next action depends on the type of fan:

Free Methods to reduce the noise level:

There are several free methods that could reduce the noise level of your computer.

• Software driven

Software like Speedfan or RivaTuner can control the fan speed of certain devices that support this feature. You could reduce the rotation speed of your cpu, gpu and case fans this way. I’m not aware that a similar product exists for power supply fans and northbridge fans.

It is furthermore possible to reduce the reading speed of your CD and DVD drives to reduce their noise level. Software exists for Linux and Windows.

Use Technology like AMDs Cool’n'Quiet to reduce the heat output of your system which could result in a lower spinning fan.

• Firmware Updates

Updating the firmware of a device could result in additional functionality. I had to upgrade the firmware of my Nvidia 6600 GT card to be able to read its temperature which I needed to control the fan speed.

It might be worth checking out if there are updates for your motherboard, graphic card and CD / DVD drives.

• Temporary Solutions

I once had the problem that the high pitching noise that my hard drives made would drive me crazy. I had no means of purchasing dampening devices at that time and had to find a solution that would reduce the noise. I came up with a solution that I found in a forum on the internet.

I used the foam that the hard drive shipped with and placed it on the bottom of my computer. I then connected the hard drive as usual and placed it on that foam. The noise was not there anymore. This method worked great but would pose problems if you want to transport your computer.

• Remove Fans

I know of users who have three or more case fans running at the same time thinking of the more the better. This is not always the case. If your system is cool enough you could try and remove some of the fans to reduce the overall noise level.

You should only remove them if you hear them. Does not make sense to remove something that does not make that much noises.

Low Cost Solutions:

It is not really that expensive to reduce the noise level of your computer. You will never get a truly silent computer but the level can be reduced that you can barely hear the computer running which is the optimum for fan driven systems.

• Replacing Fans

Bigger Fans that rotate slower make less noise than smaller fans that have to rotate higher for the same cooling results. It is possible to replace several fans, mainly the CPU fan, GPU fan, Northbridge fan and case fans.

Make sure you do not go out and buy the first new fan that claims to be running silent. Visit websites like Silent Pc Review and read their articles and participate in the forums. They do recommend good components which should reduce the noise level a lot.

• Dampening

Use Dampening material to reduce the noise level. Standard sized kits exist for many computer cases but it is also possible to purchase mats that you have to cut by yourself to make them fit in your computer.

They normally consists of rubber, foam or similar noise dampening material and are glued to the inside of your case. Please note that this method could result in a temperature increase which would mean that you would have to add fans to reduce the temperature again.

Dampening can also be used to counter the high pitching vibrations of hard drives. Low Cost solutions reduce the vibrations by placing a dampening material between the hard drives and your computer case.

I’m still using the foam mats that shipped with my hard drives. I have placed them beneath my hard drives in the hard drive cages which reduced the vibration to a level where I’m not able to hear it anymore.

• Fan Controls

You could buy fan controls which make it possible to reduce the fan rotating speed. This could be worthwhile if you can’t control the fans with a software. I do control my CPU fan this way.

Conclusion:

It does not have to be expensive to reduce the noise level of your computer. Most users will be happy with the solutions that I have posted. Advanced users with enough money could take a look at advanced concepts such as passive cooling devices (they are fanless) or water cooling their complete system.

I would begin by evaluation the free methods and only use the low cost ones if the noise is still unbearable for you. Please let me know if you have further techniques to reduce the noise in your computer.

A guy suggested to use the freeware RivaTuner which he said was able to reduce the fan speed of my video card by altering the fan speed directly. This was the solution I was looking for. I quickly downloaded and installed Rivatuner. The only thing left was to lower the fan speed and make the changes permanent.

I clicked on customize in the first screen that appeared right next to Forceware detected and selected the icon for system settings from the panel. The second tab was named fan, the goal of my search. I was able to define a fan speed value for three different states: standard 2D, low power 3D and performance 3D. I changed the settings from 100% to 25 in standard 2D mode, 50% for low power 3D and 100% for performance 3D. 2D means everything that you do normally in windows like using office, surfing the internet or writing an email.

I checked the box that saved the settings and applied them at every system start and voila – the noise was gone. From one second to the next it was gone. My pc is almost silent now, the noisiest part is my external hard drive, everything else is almost silently. (I bought a low noise cpu fan and power supply).

I suggest you take a look at Rivatuner if you face a similar problem like I did. It might solve yours too