Why Do I Keep Hearing This Loud Bell

Why Do I Keep Hearing This Loud Bell

I keep hearing this loud bell at 8 am and 8 pm.

I am running WindowsVista on an HP Pavillion DV9700
laptop.

Is this a software or hardware issue and how do I
turn the darn thing off? It's so loud that if I'm
concentrating on something else it's startles the
heck out of everyone in the room.

Thanks for your help.

 

Do you have some sort of a clock program running in the background?

 

For whom the bell tolls.......


Yeah, a list of programs installed would help. Otherwise we are grasping at straws.

 

Synaptics Pointing Device Driver
HD Audio Control Panel ( Realtek )
Install Shield Update Service
ISTray
AVG Internet Security
Nvidia Vista Driver Ver 177.13
Adobe Acrobat
Adobe Reader and Acrobat Manager
RAID Event Monitor ( Intel )
Microsoft Windows Operating System
Adobe Reader Speed Launcher
Light Scribe ( Hewlett Packard )
Microsoft Vista Sidebar

The Vista Sidebar has a clock but I can't find any option for an alarm.

Thanks.

 

Well, I know it isn't the following

Synaptics
HD Audio Control Panel
NVidia Driver
Adobe Acrobat
Adobe Reader and Acrobat Manager
Adobe Reader speed launcher
Microsoft Vista Sidebar

I don't have experience using the other pieces of software so I can't comment on those.

 

Check avg auto update and auto scan scheduled time, pretty sure its that.

 

Well, it sure seems as if you have an alarm somewhere on your system (maybe in AVG, RAID, the sidebar clock, or even perhaps the Install Shield Update Service.) Here's a long shot, but it might pay off: Why don't you try doing an Advanced Search for any of the key words that you think might be associated with an alarm setting. If you hit pay dirt, it might take you to the file that controls the alarm setting and/or volume.

From anywhere in Vista, press the Windows Key + F (or go into the Start Menu, and from inside the Search pane, press F3).
That brings up the Search page - click the Advanced Search button to the far top-right, to open the Advanced Search Set Up page.
On the Set-Up page, check the 'Include non-indexed, hidden, and system files' option.
Under Location, select Computer, or Everywhere, and in the Name box, fill in the first keyword, i.e. alarm, and click on the Search button.

After this first search is completed, if it wasn't successful, do additional searches for any other key words you think might be associated with alarms and/or volume settings. The search could take 20 seconds or 20 minutes, depending on how many files/folders there are to go through, but hopefully, you'll find the file that controls that alarm.

PS I noticed your post over at the Vista Forums, (Vista Forums > Vista Forums > General Discussion Why Do I Keep Hearing This Loud Bell?) and Zigzag3143 had a great suggestion: "Its software and you can look in Event Viewer for its cause. type event viewer in search and go to the windows logs, application tab. look at the times when the bell goes off and you might be able to ID it." You might be able add some of the possible key words you come up with in the Event Viewer to your Advanced Search.

 

Try opening the sound mixer and watching it at 8:00 when the alarm goes off. Vista will show each application that is outputting audio in the mixer. Maybe it will show up there when the chime occurs. You could probably also track it down using process explorer from microsoft.com/sysinternals.

 

lol................10char

 

Scotty986 have you solved your problem yet? I'm curious to know what caused the alarms and if any of the suggestions helped.