IMac noise/sound

Hi,
My 11 month old iMac had it's hard drive replaced in November and ever since has made a strange noise.
It makes a sort of 'blip' beep sound at random intervals. Similar to submarine, although not quite the same. I don't get the sound on start up, but I always get it when the screensaver has been on. Otherwise it seems totally random. I also hear it with the sound switched off.
I'm guessing it's some sort of alert sound, however I've looked for ways to identify it or switch it off and come up with nothing. It's only done this since it came back from repair.
Any help with identifying it would be very gratefully received as it's starting to drive me mad!
Dani. x

Sorry to hear of your pending insanity.
You can start looking in System Preferences and checking the preferences for any applications that are open when you hear it. I suspect it just going off because some preference is checked.
You can also do a SMC reset, I doubt that will do anything but it won't hurt it either.
*SMC RESET*
• Shut down the computer.
• Unplug the computer's power cord and all peripherals.
• Press and hold the power button for 5 seconds.
• Release the power button.
• Attach the computers power cable.
• Press the power button to turn on the computer.
*PRAM RESET*
• Shut down the computer.
• Locate the following keys on the keyboard: Command, Option, P, and R. You will need to hold these keys down simultaneously in step 4.
• Turn on the computer.
• Press and hold the Command-Option-P-R keys. You must press this key combination before the gray screen appears.
• Hold the keys down until the computer restarts and you hear the startup sound for the second time.
Roger

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Imac noise

I just bought a new imac i7 quad core and it is a piece of crap!
Since 1984 I have purchased over 50 mac computers for my business, and am loyal to the brand. Moreover, I have endured Apple's abysmal quality control issues, and still... I remain loyal.
But today was the final straw.
Yo... APPLE...
Fix the external noise/sound problem. Over 2800 posts on your own support site, and if you google, over 68,900 quires for the same problem.
SOUND... CRAPPY, NOISY Sound!
The new iMac i7 computer makes a hi pitched (or low buzzing sound), whenever used with a sound card or external audio interface. Whenever you hook up external speakers, the crappy sound is present.
I do audio for a living and you can't make it work without noise????
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Your opinion would be better voiced here.

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if your machine was okay, up to the point of your 'experiment' with installing windows, it looks like your problems stem from a dodgy reinstall after the bootcamp attempt [i did the same thing, duing the formatting prep for windows, erased the os x partition bahhh]...i reinstalled and i haven't had any problems since[trying to find a slipstreaming scheme with the older xp pro disk i have].
importantly, though is this clicking sound, not good.
i'd like to know, through looking in the apple system profiler what brand HDD your machine came with. there would be letters designating western digital, seagate or maxtor.
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Emacs and imacs noise?

How do you compare the noise emacs and imacs make?
The only thing I don't want for my eMac is the noisy fan. And maybe I'll switch for an iMac.
Thank you

eMacs are noise pollution city.
I registered the constant noise from a old eMac 800 mhz at being 73db.
It drives you batty.
The iMac's are virtually silent, only making a slight kechunk sound when eatting and spitting cd's. You'll love it. They are quieter than most PowerMac G5's.
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http://appleintelfaq.com/

IMac noise/sound

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