PSU chirping sound

[nem2]

I've had this Be Quiet! Pure Power 12 M on my new build for a few months now but I don't remember when the sound started it's definitely been over a month. I don't think it responds to load, sometimes its loud on idle and sometimes it's not there under heavy use. Does this mean it's failing? It doesn't bother me much I just want to know if I should replace it. There's an audio file in the .zip attached.

 

[_roman_]

Did you made any hardware changes in that period of time? Did you made any changes in Software for the unknown components? e.g. UEFI settings?

 

[Chrispy_]

Chirping noises from PCs are generally nothing to worry about. It's just coil-whine from what I can hear and it's harmless.

Coil whine is often very dependent on the graphics card, and at specific loads. Try implementing a framerate cap or using vsync. If you're already using vsync, try changing your monitor's refresh rate.

If you're worried about it, send a query to Be Quiet's support department. They'll likely ask you to send more info which is work, and if they do indulge you in a swap-out, you'll be without a PSU for probably at least 2 weeks.

Personally, I'd just fire up HWInfo or OCCT and check the voltages are within spec and stable under load. If all is good, forget about it - coil while is pretty normal and no big deal.

 

[nem2]

Did you made any hardware changes in that period of time? Did you made any changes in Software for the unknown components? e.g. UEFI settings?

I've not made any hardware changes. I set some curves for CPU and case fans using CoolerControl. I don't remember changing anything in UEFI except for the fan mode from standard to silent.

Chirping noises from PCs are generally nothing to worry about. It's just coil-whine from what I can hear and it's harmless.

Coil whine is often very dependent on the graphics card, and at specific loads. Try implementing a framerate cap or using vsync. If you're already using vsync, try changing your monitor's refresh rate.

If you're worried about it, send a query to Be Quiet's support department. They'll likely ask you to send more info which is work, and if they do indulge you in a swap-out, you'll be without a PSU for probably at least 2 weeks.

Personally, I'd just fire up HWInfo or OCCT and check the voltages are within spec and stable under load. If all is good, forget about it - coil while is pretty normal and no big deal.

I thought it was coil whine too and didn't pay much attention to it but from what I've heard on youtube coil whine sounds different. Mine isn't a continuous tone, it has bursts, but maybe it's still coil whine but at lower intensity. I'm actually planning on getting rid of the GPU then replacing my CPU with one that has integrated graphics and use that instead because I don't actually need a dedicated GPU, and its fans are making annoying noises sometimes. So I'll see if that fixes the problem.

 

[Chrispy_]

Fill out your hardware specs when you get a minute. Intermittent coil chirping can be triggered by drive activity as well as CPU/GPU activity.

 

[nem2]

Fill out your hardware specs when you get a minute. Intermittent coil chirping can be triggered by drive activity as well as CPU/GPU activity.

B760M PG Riptide DDR5
i5 12600KF
Gtx1650
2 NVMe and 1 sata SSD

 

[Bill_Bright]

PSU chirping sound

I'm actually planning on getting rid of the GPU then replacing my CPU with one that has integrated graphics and use that instead because I don't actually need a dedicated GPU, and its fans are making annoying noises sometimes. So I'll see if that fixes the problem.

It seems now you are not 100% sure the source of the sound. You say "chirp" - from my experience a "chirp" is a totally different sound from a "whine". A chirp is a single (though perhaps repeating) "high" frequency noise lasting less than a second. A whine (which may come or go), also "high" frequency, typically lasts for many seconds, minutes or even continuously.

FTR, I heard neither a chirp or a whine your sound file. I did, however, hear a "low" frequency hum. Not sure the source of the hum. I just know it is not on this end as I have a quality sound system that does not hum with any other sounds. So the hum originated on your end somewhere. HOWEVER, my ears spent 24 years on or adjacent to military air fields and nearly 3 times that listening to Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, etc. at military jet SPLs! So the fact I cannot hear high frequency sound does not mean it is not there.

I suggest you try to isolate and identify the source of the sound, and try to further, and more accurately describe the sound. You can "CAREFULLY" unmount the PSU and let it "hang" outside the case to [hopefully] let you accurately pinpoint the source as coming from the PSU or still inside the case.

Another trick is to use the inner cardboard tube of a roll of paper towels as a stethoscope. This will allow you to pinpoint the sound as coming from the PSU, the graphics card, the motherboard, etc.

Regardless, do not wait too long to identify the source. You don't want to jeopardize your RMA options.

 

[Chrispy_]

Grab Furmark, Crystaldiskmark, and OCCT; Identifying the noise is hard if you don't reliably know what's causing it.

Furmark can stress the GPU to 100% very easily,
OCCT has CPU-only tests and RAM-only tests.
Crystaldiskmark will let you stress your storage.

You say you don't think it responds to load, but these utilities will let you try all the different kinds of load. Any correlation between a specific workload and an increase in the chirping from the PSU will help you narrow down what causes it.

FTR, I heard neither a chirp or a whine your sound file. I did, however, hear a "low" frequency hum. Not sure the source of the hum. I just know it is not on this end as I have a quality sound system that does not hum with any other sounds. So the hum originated on your end somewhere. HOWEVER, my ears spent 24 years on or adjacent to military air fields and nearly 3 times that listening to Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, etc. at military jet SPLs! So the fact I cannot hear high frequency sound does not mean it is not there.

It's pretty clear to my ears. The low hum is the system fans. There's an arhythmic squeal/squeaking trill that's unmistakably coil whine to me and I agree with OP in that its not the consistent single-tone squeal you tend to hear out of graphics cards at a relatively stable high framerates.

It's somewhere around 10-11khz, if that helps.

 

[Bill_Bright]

The low hum is the system fans.

No, the hum is not fans. What I hear is a much lower frequency than that. Fan noise is pretty distinctive, and consistent with temps - and unfortunately, something my ears are acutely attuned to (since I REALLY hate fan noise).

But again, a chirp is not a whine. There may be a whine in the sound file that you are picking up, but that would not normally be described as a chirp.

We need the OP to come back and clarify what the sound is - to him.

 

[Shrek]

Chirping is typical of how switched mode power supplies work, so I would not be concerned.

 

[nem2]

No, the hum is not fans. What I hear is a much lower frequency than that. Fan noise is pretty distinctive, and consistent with temps - and unfortunately, something my ears are acutely attuned to (since I REALLY hate fan noise).

But again, a chirp is not a whine. There may be a whine in the sound file that you are picking up, but that would not normally be described as a chirp.

We need the OP to come back and clarify what the sound is - to him.

What else would it be if not the fans? They can sound different depending on the mic (mine is not great quality) and ambient noise from the environment. I thought the chirping was easily identifiable in that audio, There are some continuous sounds and there's one that's intermittent, which is what I meant by chirp. I edited the original audio to make it more pronounced, not sure if it makes much of a difference. There's a constant background hiss and then there's the "chirp".

 

[Princess Garnet]

My previous PSU used to have a chirp sound and it was indeed different from coil whine. It was like that since I got it, but it was rather infrequent (and random) in how it would occur.

I ended up narrowing down the cause as the fan itself. The PSU had two settings for the fan; one setting would always have the fan on and the other would only have it on when needed (called "eco" mode). If it was always on, it would rarely go through intervals of producing that chirping sound. I noticed in eco mode, it would never occur, probably because the fan was never spinning in that mode because I never put the PSU under enough of a load to necessitate it. Realistically, it was a mistake on my part not to do RMA at that point but since eco mode "solved" the issue for me, I felt it was a waste of time and an otherwise good PSU.

Noises usually occur from mechanical things (even coil whine is mechanics because it's rapid vibrations causing high frequency noises). So if it's not coil whine, and if you don't have water cooling or a hard drive present... that almost has to narrow it down to a fan in my mind? And the way you describe it as a "chirp" matches exactly what my PSU fan did.

 

[RejZoR]

My BeQuiet Dark Power 11 Pro 750W was making chirping noises to a point it was literally driving me mad because the rest of the system was so quiet I could constantly hear it chirping. Then I opened it and filled the open transformer coils with hot glue because I was suspecting it was the coils resonating under specific loads. It has been dead silent since.

If you're going to try the same thing, just make sure you do it when it's disconnected from main power! It's best to disconnect PSU from wall while PC is running so it will discharge most capacitors. Then leave it fully unplugged for 1 hour just to be sure. Then you can work on it and still avoid touching any of components inside directly. If unsure, ask someone who knows what they are doing to do it for you.

EDIT:
Some are saying the chirping is from other components. I disagree. I've had Corsair PSU that had a cycling chirping that was in exact intervals. It was a spring inside the fan bearing catching and skipping creating perfectly timed interval noise. What I hear from the recording here is fluctuating noise based on load the system is experiencing because it's constantly changing. Also the fan inside is BeQuiet fan so super unlikely it's causing the noise.

 

[Chrispy_]

What else would it be if not the fans? They can sound different depending on the mic (mine is not great quality) and ambient noise from the environment. I thought the chirping was easily identifiable in that audio, There are some continuous sounds and there's one that's intermittent, which is what I meant by chirp. I edited the original audio to make it more pronounced, not sure if it makes much of a difference. There's a constant background hiss and then there's the "chirp".

Harmless coil whine for sure, it's very very easy to say that now you've edited out the fan noise.

I've heard that more times than I care to count - if it bothers you then change PSU, but just be aware that with a different PSU you could still experience coil whine - if not from the different PSU, then a new PSU could cause a component like your GPU or motherboard VRMs to start whining instead.

It's a lottery. You can void your warranty and hot glue components inside your PSU but that's obviously not advisable for reasons of shock risk and you'd lose the long warranty from BeQuiet! too. You can try and isolate the noise and if it's tied to another component you can try swapping the port/slot of that component.

Since you have a dual-rail PSU, you can try mixing around the modular ports for your CPU and GPU so that they're sharing one rail (if they're currently split) or vice-versa. The ports on the PSU side look clearly labelled to me. You can also try separating the cables out - coil whine is resonance and ocassionally (not a guarantee) it is dependent on EMI crosstalk between different power cables that are bound tightly together in cable management channels of modern cases. I've seen a bad coil whine go away once simply by separating out the 24-pin, 8-pins, and 12VHPWR cable so that they're not all right next to each other.

TL;DR, move stuff around, experiment.

Does this mean it's failing? It doesn't bother me much I just want to know if I should replace it.

No, and if it doesn't bother you much then I think just live with it, or at least don't experiment with moving stuff around in a way that you can't revert again.

It's definitely possible to move stuff around and make the coil whine louder, so if you're not that bothered with the noise at the moment, that's a pretty strong argument to leave it alone.

 

[AsRock]

Sounds like the fan is catching \ rubbing a little.

 

[Chrispy_]

Sounds like the fan is catching \ rubbing a little.

That would be a perfectly rhythmic pattern though, which this isn't.

 

[nem2]

Sounds like the fan is catching \ rubbing a little.

I've looked at the fan and couldn't see anything rubbing it.

I'll just keep this PSU and maybe try changing stuff like Chirspy suggested.
Btw I found this reddit post with the same PSU having exact same issue:

https://www.reddit.com/r/bequietofficial/comments/1bis56m/be_quiet_pure_power_12_m_750w_makes_sound_like_a

 

[Wirko]

Another trick is to use the inner cardboard tube of a roll of paper towels as a stethoscope. This will allow you to pinpoint the sound as coming from the PSU, the graphics card, the motherboard, etc.

And we shall not forget to mention that the sound can also be recorded, not just listened to, through the tube.

 

[Bill_Bright]

I thought the chirping was easily identifiable in that audio

Of course. But that makes sense. You already knew the actual sound so you knew what to listen for and when to anticipated it when listening.

What else would it be if not the fans?

Coil whine. Transformer hum. Even "singing" capacitors - which can be VERY annoying.

I note on your new sound file, I no longer hear the hum I heard before. I am not hearing any chirp either, or whine, though my tinnitus might be masking that frequency this morning. That said, the remastered Roy Orbison and Oh, Pretty Woman sounds great and full range with my surround sound, THX speakers, so don't know why I don't hear any whine.

Have you physically isolated the PSU, or used the inner tube stethoscope to positively identify the sound as coming from the PSU? This is essential!

The problem is due to how PSUs physically mount to PC cases, plus the fact PC cases are cavernous echo chambers. The solid contact between the PSU and case causes PSU sounds and vibrations to easily reverberate throughout the case and can make the sound/vibration appear to come from other than the actual source.

You would be very upset if you sent your PSU in for replacement only to discover the sound is actually coming from your graphics card or motherboard. Plus, if Be Quiet! tests the PSU and finds nothing wrong, they can charge you a restocking fee.

Sounds like the fan is catching \ rubbing a little.

That would be a perfectly rhythmic pattern though, which this isn't.

It would change as the rotation speed changes. But a visual inspection should easily determine if the blades are scraping a wire or foreign object. And the OP said he can't see anything like that.

@nem2 - do note there are no "user serviceable" parts inside a PSU in terms of warranties. You risk voiding the warranty if you open the case. Not to mention, anything that plugs into the wall can kill! And "IF" faulty, then sadly, residual deadly voltages can remain for extended periods after power is removed. Therefore, opening and servicing a PSU should only be done by qualified personnel.

Typically, coil whine does NOT affect the life of the offending component. So whether or not you wish to return it under warranty support is up to you. Me? If the sound is not supposed to be there, it is not acceptable. And coil whine is not supposed to be there.

 

[dirtyferret]

Coil whine

Coil whine or fan would be my guess. Fan is fairly easy to check especially if you set up the PC out of the case and unplug the fan under a light load for a few minutes.

 

[Bill_Bright]

Another way to check to see (hear) if the fan is making the noise is to press a wooden glue/Popsicle stick onto the center hub of the fan for a couple seconds. This action will change the rotation speed of the fan and that, in turn, will alter any noise the fan is making. If the sound remains constant, it is not the fan making the noise.

 

[nem2]

UPDATE: removed my GPU and switched to an integrated card. The noise is almost gone, I can sometimes hear it when I get closer to the case but it's much quieter. I think I'll keep the this PSU. Thanks everyone for responding.

 

[Bill_Bright]

Well, if you are happy with "almost gone", then there's really nothing more for us to offer. Thanks for posting your update!