On Mon, Jun 20, 2005 at 01:34:58PM -0400, William Case wrote: > If I turn my speakers on I get horrible squawking and static that > seems to shadow all my keystrokes etc. This sounds like my laptop. The cause (in my case, as far as I can tell) is a cheap (onboard) sound card plus general interference from the various laptop components, all of which have their own EM fields, share a common ground element, etc. In particular, the AC adaptor provides a ton of noise (besides getting very hot); if I put my ear to the adaptor, I actually get the same buzzing and tweeting that I get from the soundcard. Similarly, if I touch a stereo jack with the laptop running on my lap, I become a giant antenna for the EM from the laptop as a whole, and buzzing ensues. The buzzing is much less without the laptop present. In a PC, this interference should naturally be less, because stuff isn't packed so close together. An onboard soundcard will have some noise, though. How loud is this noise you report? Is it background noise (relatively speaking), or very loud? In your case, I would check the connectors. Make sure they're pushed in *all* the way. I've seen connectors that don't *look* unplugged but are making that same kind of noise; giving them a little extra push locks them deep in place and stops the noise.
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