Noises coming from my HP Pavilion ze4400

[LuckyTaxi]

Everytime I scroll or use the mouse to click on something I get this little buzzing noise. It sounds like it's coming from the left side where the fan is. The fan seems normal, but its annoying evrything I scroll up/down the screen and everytime the screen has to refresh or display a new page in explorer.

I even hear it when i start clicking on the Start Menu and navigate my way through there.

I installed the video drivers so that can't be it. I'm running at 1024x768

 

[Scatterpack]

Sorry can't help you but, my MS intelly mouse has been bleeding my external speaker's when I scroll so I might put a choke on the cord.

Gateway solo 5300CL Laptop

P-III@750
14.1 TFT XGA @ 1024x768
Win ME
256-Ram
Savage/IX 8-Meg 2x AGP Video
Savage Tweak
X-setup
10 gig hrd
Hotswap-cdr/dvd//floppy
RR-Cable
Net-Zero-Platt (on the road)
MS Optical Mouse
Cyber Acoustic speaker's
Built in Mic. /Jensen External Mic.


This thing get's so hot that I use it for a Camping Stove!

 

[bogdan2]

I bought a ZE4430 back in August and I believe we have the same problem. The noise only happened for me on battery power and was very hard to predict. It was very annoying too... it sounded like there was a cricket stuck under the keyboard! It seems to affect all Athlon based Pavilion 4xxx series all the way back to the 4100 series!

If you go over to the IT Forums HP's website, there are various theories as to why this happens. The best explanation I found deals with a capacitor improperly using a throttling frequency of 2khz. This throttling takes place when the mobile Athlon dynamically switches speed based on CPU load. Anyway, 2 khz is in the range of audible sound, hence the noise. Try this thread to see what I mean:

http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/questionanswer.do?threadId=67056

This sounded a little too Star Trek to me as well at first, but several people claimed that a BIOS update should fix the problem by pushing the throttling frequency beyond the range of human hearing to 30khz. Sure enough, BIOS revision KA.M1.49 squashed the cricket! It's not really posted anywhere I could easily find on the HP site so I had to do a search for it. You can find it at:

http://h18007.www1.hp.com/support/files/hpcpqnk/us/download/19390.html

It's a self extracting executable so it should do all the work for you, update the BIOS and reboot the machine. Just make sure you don't have any antivirus software running since it gets tripped up in it.

If you're nervous about flashing your BIOS without further proof that we have the same problem, try this. Download this CPU control utility (which is nice to have even without this problem!):

http://www.diefer.de/speedswitchxp/index.html

Load it up and set it to Max Battery. If the noise goes away, then we have the same problem and you can safely do the BIOS update. Of course the catch here is that this utility only seemed to have any effect for me only after I updated to BIOS revision KA.M1.48 which is also available on HP's site. Just go and search their drivers section for the ZE4430 model. So all in all, since you probably have to do a BIOS update to see if we have the same problem, you're probably better off flashing to version 49!

Whatever you do, don't involve HP! They're clueless. They thought it was the hard drive, then the battery, then the CPU fan. What nonsense! I even sent it to them to get it repaired and they sent it back with the same problem and with a scratched case to boot!

This is somewhat long winded, but I hope it helps!

 

[LuckyTaxi]

My laptop is a ze4427wm to be exact. The drivers page for this particular model ONLY has the 1.48 BIOS updte available.
Should I just move to 1.49?

I downloaded the utility and set it to max battery power. the noise went away!

 

[bogdan2]

Correct. The drivers for the 4420 will probably only list the 1.48 BIOS. I know for the 4430, that was the latest version. Unfortunately, HP is very slow to update their pages. Since my PC reacted the same way with the Speedswitch utility, I'm pretty confident that we have the same problem.

Having said that, download the 49 BIOS from the link above (the one starting with http://18007) and apply it. It should make the noise go away regardless of the battery setting.

You can also remain only with the Speedswitch solution, but the problem with that is that the "Max Battery" setting restricts the CPU to a maximum of 500~ mhz. It's a shame to cripple your PC like that when running on battery power just to make the noise go away. BIOS 49 will make it go away at all speeds and settings, so it's a better solution.

 

[LuckyTaxi]

yes - 1.49 fixed the problem! thanks soooooooooooo much

now if only the fan would be a little more quieter!

 

[bogdan2]

Glad to be of service. I know how relieved I was when I found out about it. Some people have been putting up with the noise for over a year!

I know what you mean about the fan. I was swinging away at Tiger Woods golf on it last night and the fan sounded like an F-15 about to take off. But they have to cool those beasts somehow! If all I'm doing is web browsing or e-mail, it's somewhat bearable.

 

[LuckyTaxi]

ever since i updated my bios i can't turn the laptop on until i hit the reset button at the bottom of the laptop.
also, when i go into the bios setup, it reads hp pavilion 4300?

i have the 4400 series!

while i got rid of the annoying noise coming from the fan, i can't turn my laptop on until the reset button is pressed.
can i downgrade the bios?

 

[bogdan2]

I have read of some problems wit the KA.M1.49 BIOS on the HP forums. HP seems to have taken it down, since the link to the file is dead.

Sorry that it caused problems on your machine. On mine, it worked just fine. I even checked my BIOS and is says it's a 4400. Our models are a bit different (4430us vs. 4427wm) but I thought that the BIOS was valid for all 4400 series. Go figure!

You can try to downgrade to the 48 BIOS, but I'm not sure it'll work. I've seen a few other posts from people trying to do exactly that with other BIOS versions, and it seems it detects which version you have and won't overwrite a newer version with an older one.

Having said that, you can probably still give it a try. Go to the downloads page for your mahcine on the HP and give it a whirl...

http://h20015.www2.hp.com/en/softwa...osoft Windows XP&sw_lang=en&pagetype=software

I also read that HP is working on a newer version, i.e. the 50, which might solve your problem... and hopefully not create new ones!

http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/bizsupport/questionanswer.do?threadId=239913

Again, sorry for the unexpected behavior. It's pretty bad to have to reset it every time you need to turn it on. From now on, I'll be more careful with upgrading the BIOS myself.

You can also try posting on the HP forums, and see what they say about it. Also ask them about downgrading BIOS. They're quite knowledgeable over there, so if they say a new BIOS is on the way, I believe them.

 

[LuckyTaxi]

hey - dont even worry about it. i dont have to hear that annoying noise anymore!!!!
as long as my laptop turns on i'm a happy camper. i called HP and i think im gonna go ahead
and send the lappy back to them. hopefully they dont take too long!