Turn Off the Annoying Windows XP System Beeps
When you spend a lot of time in front of your computer, the annoying beeps start to drive you mad after a while. I really don’t need to be told that I hit the wrong key anymore, so I’ve compiled a list of how to turn off all the system beeps in Windows XP.
One of the most irritating beeps happens when you use the Volume control… but there are other beeps, such as on error dialogs or when you hit the wrong key.
Disable Beep in Device Manager
Open up Device Manager by right-clicking on Computer and choosing Properties, then on the Hardware tab you’ll find the button for Device Manager.
Select View \ Show hidden devices from the menu.
Find Non-Plug and Play Drivers in the list, and then right-click on “Beep” and disable it:
When it prompts you to reboot, select no, and then right-click again and choose Properties this time. On the Driver tab, change the Startup type to “Disabled” and then click the “Stop” button if you are able to.
This should disable the system beep speaker, but it probably won’t change the volume control beep, so continue on.
Disabling Beep in Registry
Open up regedit.exe through the run box, and then navigate down to the following key:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Sound
Find the “Beep” key on the right-hand side and change the value to “no”.
Disable Beep in Sounds Panel
Open up Control Panel and find the Sounds and Audio Devices panel, choose the Sounds tab and then find “Default Beep” in the list.
Change the sound drop-down on the bottom to “None” and then click Apply. This should disable the volume control beep.
You’ll want to also change Critical Stop to “None” as well, and should probably also turn off some of the other items.
You can also use TweakUI to get rid of some of the beeps, but if you follow the items on this page you shouldn’t need that.
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The steps are;
1. Right-click on My Computer
2. On the Hardware tab, click on [Device Manager]
3. On the “View” menu, select “Show hidden devices”
4. Under “Non-Plug and Play Drivers”, right-click “Beep”
5. Click “Disable”
6. Answer [Yes] when asked if you really want to disable it
7. Answer [No] when asked if you want to reboot
8. Right-click “Beep” again.
9. Click “Properties”
10. On the “Driver” tab, set the Startup type to Disabled
11. Click [Stop]
12. Click [OK]
13. Answer [No] when asked if you want to reboot
This is one of the first things I do when I have to rebuild a PC. I didn’t know about the registry tweak though – that can come in handy for unattended installations. Thanks!
re: “Turn Off the Annoying Windows XP System Beeps�
I did all these things and my computer still beeps when a download completes. In the registry I even went back and tried this:
{default] REG_SZ {value not set} I changed this to 0
Beep REG_SZ no
ExtendedSounds REG_SZ yes I changed this to no
I am grateful that while trying this I noticed in the Sounds and Audio Devices Properties where to turn off the Windows startup and shutdown annoying sounds and that worked.
This is a sanity-saver!
I was using a database that was beeping at me twice for each data item (there are a couple of hundred of them to be processed), and I was slowly starting to become ‘beep-happy’ when my colleague sent me this link.
Pure, silent bliss!
Thanks sooooooo much!
Phew… thanks a lot. I was right about smashing my box to pieces
What a relief…
I followed every step twice but , my pc still beeps anoyingly
Which annoying beep does the disabling beeps in registry step get rid of?
Thanks for the help. I use mysql for school and every time I make a mistake in the syntax of a command, the beep for the error is louder on my laptop than any other computer beep I have heard elsewhere.
Following these instructions will disable ToggleKeys; the setting which sounds a beep whenever you hit the CAPSLOCK or NUMLOCK keys.
That was very helpful indeed thank you
you rock – great article!
God! You saved my life! You dunno how mad I used to get while I was in a library or stuff and I got these annoying scandalous beeps just because I mistyped my pwd!
Thank you a lot!
Thanks for the sanity !!!
thank you! I love you for this, I would hug and kiss you if you were here. I have been so angry about this for years. Our environment is so sound-polluted it’s driving me mad. Now I can go on to the next task, to mute colleagues and their cell signals.
thanks very much- that beep noise was so loud it was driving me crazy.
thanks again.
Thanks a bunch! This post helped me solve that irritating problem. That beep was horrible when wearing ear phones, it seemed to beep at full system volume into the hears.
No beeping annoyance for every Windows pop-up! Bliss! Thanks!
Thanks a million! Always hated the beep, but nearly killed my brand new laptop when it piped that beep FULL FORCE through my headphones while gaming! My husbnd found this site and together you saved my sanity!
I’ve made all the system, device manager and registry changes suggested, the beeping persists. One reference I’ve found suggests that since I use the Award bios version, the cause is a memory or video issue. I’ve re-seated both the video card and the memory sticks, issue re-occurs. What shall I do next?
Author. You are the best. The best “how to”article I ever came across. Well done.
This article is a lifesaver. This method was the only thing that allowed me to finally shut off the sounds in the guest machines running windows under VMWare. THANK YOU!
Excellent man! its awesome, really wanted to get rid of this and couldnt find the solution. its great that sound was driving me crazy.errrr
Thanks alot!
I’m still awaiting reply to my entry of 6/4/08.
Even XP Smoker Pro hasn’t done anything for my issue during the few hours I’ve used that utility thus far.
Oh thank you. Thank you. I thought I was alone; & was considering putting a switch on the speaker. Now life has become bearable. However:-
a) On implementing all of your recommendations, I still got a lot of beeps until I entered ‘No Sounds’ in the ‘Sound scheme’ box of the ‘Sounds and Audio Devices Properties’ panel – ref the last picture of your article.
b) I still get beeps during the close-down/re-start following a new software installation. Any ideas?
Thanks for the help. The software I run has a system beep every time you shut it down. Well, one day i was listening to my headphones, I forgot about the beep and well lets just say I’ll never do that again.
At least I won’t be able to have it happen again.
Thank you very much. My ears are still ringing from the last beep through my headphones. One time i was in the library and connecting to wireless network and it beeped so loud in my headphones that i jumped up…i was humiliated by the beep.
Thank you so much, your instructions were so easy to follow!!! and I am so thankful to have that beep gone
THANK YOU!!!!!!
Thank you very much >>>> Helpfull topic
YAyyy!!
thank u
Thank you for helping me not throw my computer out the window. Device manager solution worked like a charm.
Brilliant, thanks! This was the one stupid beep I could never turn off on my PC, and it drove me insane. This has definitely been helpful. Thanks!
A great comprehensive post about a recurring gripe. Thanks!
Thanks..it helped it get rid of that irritating Beep
Awesome! Thank you so much, now I got rid of those annoying beeps… Thank you so much!
Thanks a billion! You saved my head from exploding!
Have a nice day!
Thank you. Life saver…
Thank you very much, it worked. Now I will not have to unless a rage murder in the office:-)
What XP theme is that in the article?
I followed your procedure but still got sporadic beeping. Eventually I discovered that the CPU temperature was just exceeding the trigger level that I had set in the BIOS. The problem would have been trival to solve if the person who wrote the BIOS had thought to program a written message to accompany the beeping.
Generally useful advice but this a hack for the particular mySQL problem you faced.
Simpler options are to run your mysql with –no-beep.
A simplex global solution is to run ‘net stop beep’ the beep service would be stopped.
Ref: http://bugs.mysql.com/bug.php?id=17088
Awesome. I have suffered my whole life under the cruel tyranny of the system beep. It is a hateful foe. This article has greatly encouraged my confidence that mankind will continue to overcome great obstacles, and will continue to thrive on the earth. Thank you.
I cannot tell you how much this helped me. I have a digitizing program that started beeping after an upgrade I did to it. I called the company, I went to several computer shops and NO ONE knew what to do! I could not draw my own designs anymore because the sound drove me and everyone around me crazy. I was thinking maybe of just getting a new computer. You saved me big bucks! Thank you SO MUCH!!!
Hey thanks for this!!! I set up computers all day long at my desk and it gets soooo freakin annoying. Much appreciated!
Thanks for the tip. It’s amazing what we go through to disable Microsoft’s “features”.
Thanks so much! The system beep is so annoying when you have your earplugs on and that it ignores the volume that you chose for your music. It has only one volume: LOUD!
YOU ROCK!
Stupid beeps driving me nuts, you have saved my sanity
Thank you very much for the useful info~! finally that annoying system beep is gone. *cries in happiness*
Dude, you have literally, and with no hint of over exageration, spared my sanity!
Cheers
very, very helpful..I had no idea about the hidden play and plug. worked like a charm
Thank you so much.
Thank you very much indeed,
Listening to music or watching vids on the computer, the beep was killing my ears.
The steps in the Device Manager are enough to disable the volume beep but one must also stop the service on the properties tab of the driver to see the immediate effects.
Thx again.
Thanks for the article. I followed the steps and was very hopefully that I was telling AutoCAD to shut the hell up, but after the steps, it still beeped. I re-rentered the control panel item and looked through the list and found one called Exclamation, which I set to none and BINGO!! no more annoying beeps from a window asking me if I want to keep the changes for 6 billionth time. YES! Computer, learn my patterns… sheesh.
thanks very much.
it was badly annoying me very badly..
thanks again…….
Thanks This was very helpful.
Blah…..i got the same problem…
Hi
I would like to say.. this is fantastic…. the beeping noise was driving me mad and I had three laptops to sort out.
Thank you.
Sophia
Very helpful, for a Microsoft oversight. (no beep should be the default).
I kiss the ground you walk on! That noise deafened me every time I changed my volume or connected wirelessly to the internet. It’s gone now. I love you!!!
you can also goto system properties and just turn off the system speaker that way
good help
What everone else has said in praise and more – and it was so easy.
Thank you! One less patient for the asylum …
My ears and my sanity thanks you. Another lousy “feature” of M$ sorted.
thank you soooo much, my comp irritates my colleagues but i had no idea what to do to stop the stupid beep.
Many thanks!!!!!!!!
It’s so great not to hear this cracking sound anymore!!!!
Thank you!! My Dell Latitude D630 has (had
) a very loud beep.
Like everyone else who’s commented here, just wanted to say thank you for solving this INCREDIBLY annoying problem. Hopefully MS engineers look at pages like this and disable it by default someday…
Thank you! It drove me nuts.
Thank you very much for posting this. Of course I had the same problem when I had my head phones on unexpected VERY LOUD beeps were scaring a hell out of me. I am very glad that you posted this helpful and working advice. I did not need to modify Registry.
Wonderful solution. I did not have to work the registry. Thank you!!! Another attempt by MS to drive its users insane thwarted…