My pc makes a constant "clicking noise", starting a few seconds after I turn it on.

[Demetri2]

My pc makes a constant "clicking" noise, starting a few seconds after I turn it on. I've lived with this issue for years but now I really need to get rid of it. I recently became involved with sound recording, so I want to eliminate as much room noise as possible. In an effort to this, I made several changes to my pc in order to make it quieter.

For a long time I thought that this problem was associated with the fans, which were noisy in many ways, so I changed all of them. The new fans were indeed quieter, but it turned out that the "clicking" had nothing to do with the fans, because it continued (and it was the exact same sound). Yes, I double-checked and no cables were getting in the way of the fans.

My next guess was the hard drives. I removed every mechanical hdd. The only drive in my pc right now is an ssd. Same thing: Things are generally quieter, but the "clicking" noise problem still exists.

I then thought that the problem is likely electrical.

What do you guys think? Could this problem be associated with the psu or the motherboard or anything else?

[note: I also removed the optical disk drive and changed the case (I thought maybe the latter would do something about the "clicking". I was wrong)

[Xlucine]

My hunch would be the PSU fan

[Jonj1611]

Could be the fan in the psu clicking. Maybe see if you can get hold of a cheap psu so you can check it. You can also disconnect the cpu fan, you will get an error on startup but you can see if its the cpu fan causing the issue

[ik9000]

do you have any
1) fan grills hitting the fans ( look for burrs and loose threads - I had a loose thread wire snagging my front fan for a while and it was easily solved with a craft knife)
2) internal cables hitting the fans (lost a molex cable that way - the top fan shreaded the insulation in quite a quick timescale)
3) any mountings not done up properly on the mobo or CPU cooler that might be allowing resonance (probably not this from your description but when you've checked the more likely candidates...)
4) isolate each HDD in turn to see if any of them are causing it
5) as others have said, check PSU too if you have a spare you can swap in.
6) check CPU fans too.

edit, just reread your post. You've tried a lot of this. Try a 2nd PSU if possible. I presume it is a clicking and not a hum that might indicate a grounding issue?

For improving recording keep the PC behind the mics and as far away as possible and shield behind the mics (in front of you) with foam mic shields, if necessary surround the immediate area around the PC with acoustic foam, and line behind you with acoustic foam/curtains or other soft furnishing to stop reflections coming over your shoulder back towards the mic. For really quiet recording use a big air cooler with limited fan speeds, passive GPU/onboard graphics and SSDs.

If you're using directional dynamic mics you can get away with more but for studio recording you tend to use condensing mics which are a lot more sensitive and will pick up background noise if not prevented from doing so by either removing the noise as you're trying to do, or damping it out.

[Demetri2]

Thank you all for your responses. I should make a correction to my original post (Really, is there no way to edit it? I'm having a hard time trying): The noise does not begin seconds after I turn on the pc. It actually takes a few minutes. At the very best, I can get away with little less than half an hour of use without that sound spoiling everything. But once it starts it becomes almost permanent, with rare and very short breaks.

Now, I cannot find a better way to describe this noise, other than the word "clicking". I actually did record a few seconds of it, but I can't find the way to upload the file so you can hear it.

When I said that I changed all the fans, I also meant the one one the cpu cooler.

I hope it's the psu. I do have an old one that I can test out. I'll swap, turn on and let you know.

Once again, thanks a lot!

[Demetri2]

Thanks.

[Demetri2]

Thank you.

[Demetri2]

Thank you for the reply, and also your knowledge. For now, I have actually made a small custom (cheap) booth using old blankets. I am using a large diaphragm condenser and it's pretty unforgiving. I can get away with minimal fan noise (which I have mostly taken care of). But if I don't get rid of the "clicking", then the only solution (for now) would probably be to get the tower out of the room, which would make a new mess of its own.