Strange sounds

I am at wits end trying to find the cause of this. A loud “rattling” noise comes from my PC whenever a rough surface is used during takeoff/landing such as dirt/grass runways. Also when touching the ground with a helicopter. It does not matter what aircraft, VR or pancake, nothing seems to make sense. I have all sounds turned off (speakers are unplugged). It is so loud, I can feel the vibration on the floor where the computer sits. It bothers my roommate in the other room and she is threatening my life if I don’t shut it off. I have tried for a week, but cannot figure it out. Specs: 14900KF, 64 GB RAM, RTX4090, Pimax Crystal Light. Yesterday, I purposely flew the Cessna 152 along a rough bush strip so the sound would stay on longer, and got a CTD after about 5 seconds. HELP!!!

Failing fan bearings or unbalanced fans from dirt, check pc components first.

Think about software afterwards, updating or reinstalling graphics driver

Do you have a controller with any sort of rumble feature connected?

FSRealistic? That can make even the softest touchdown look & feel like you just landed a skip on a tin roof.

Thank you so much for the rapid responses! Not connected to any PC components that I can find. I can’t make the sound stay on long enough to get down to the PC to listen closely (I’m 87 years old). If I am taking off from any runway, the noise picks up as I gain speed, and then once I rotate it immediately stops. I have no controllers with a rumble feature. Use Honeycomb Alpha and Bravo, and Turtle Beach rudder pedals. I do not use FSRealistic. This has been going on for about six months, maybe longer and I always upgrade to the latest nVidia drivers as they are released. Any more ideas? Thanks again. :+1:

Possibly think about getting a pc tech guy in to have a look for you :thinking:. They do home visits as long as you’re not on some remote island :wink: :smiley:

If after six months of trying to find the cause using only your ears and a screwdriver to remove the side panel of the PC case you still can’t figure it out, then invite someone to your home who actually knows about assembling PCs, BIOS settings, and how to diagnose hardware problems.

Let him check the computer properly and try to find the source of any possible vibrations.

For example, a poorly installed HDD can cause the PC case to resonate. The fast-spinning platter in an older hard drive can also cause vibrations. But you wrote that someone can hear it in the room next door, so it’s probably not that.

As I mentioned before, invite someone who knows what they’re doing and let him also check the BIOS settings and the BIOS version, because an outdated BIOS can expose your CPU to potential damage.

I just can’t see how it can be random vibrations if it happens in such very specfic circumstances.

Is there a subwoofer that’s still active despite ‘unplugging’ the speakers?

Place the pc on some thick rubber feet. I put each wheel in chair leg rubber mount to stop pc rolling around. If floor vibrations stop you have helped your friend next door. If not, still recommend a pc specialist.
It really is safer to spend a little on 1 of these people to ensure one of your components is not failing.

Sorry to be so long in replying, but we are under severe weather conditions here on Maui (Hawaii) so have not had the computer on recently. Just to update, I am a retired PC tech (owned my own computer company for 30 years) and here are some thoughts:

  1. I only have 4 Nvme SSD drives in this system, no spinning drives.
  2. It seems to me it must be something in MSFS 2024 as it only happens during takeoff and landing with all aircraft and stops immediately when I depart the ground or when I slow to a reasonable speed after landing.
  3. It may have been happening all along as I don’t remember it never not occurring.

This may be a dumb question, but is this noise heard if you have your speakers or headphones disconnected. In other words, is the sound coming from the sim or the computer itself?

Problem solved!!! Sometimes “dumb” questions turn out to be not so dumb afterall. I disconnected all devices that could produce sound – 2nd monitor, external speakers and even my Crystal Light. None of these made a difference. So then I thought, what else could possible cause it? Then, I disconnected my XBox controller (I use it when making scenery). BINGO!! No more rumbling noises!! Since I have the controller plugged into a powered USB hub, I simply can turn off that port until I do a scenery design! Simple and easy. Thank you, everyone, I am so happy to have this resolved!

So your controller was rumbling against whatever it was sat on? We’ll have to add that one to the list of standard questions in future. Well done for identifying the cause.

Seems I called it correctly in the third post.

@BeardyBrun post marked as the solution :+1:

You can turn off the force feedback for the controller in the settings.

I just discovered that! Works great!!