Repeating mouseclicks sound at startup

[Rcoopr]

When I first open Publisher, I can hear the sound effect for mouseclicks repeating over and over, in a number of bursts.  It doesn't have any pattern and eventually after a couple of minutes it stops.  Not sure what is going on.

For normal operation of windows on my computer, the sound effect for mouseclicks is switched off.

[carl123]

I would first check the sound is coming from the speaker and not something else (like a disk drive). 

Do you still hear the sound if you switch off all your speaker settings totally?

[Rcoopr]

My laptop has no disk driver or moving parts.  It's definitely coming from the speaker.  The problem repeats at every start up of Publisher. 

[Jon P]

Bit of a stab in the dark, but if you go to Help > Welcome and untick "Show this panel on startup" at the bottom left, then close/re-open the app does it still happen?

[GarryP]

Can you describe the clicks a bit more please?

• What do they sound like?: Do they sound like a click from one of your peripherals or is it a different sound? Do they sound like plastic, or metal or wood or some other material?
• What is the pattern (or otherwise)?: Is there a distinct ‘beat’? Is there a pattern? What is the gap between clicks? Does the gap change or is it a constant duration? How quick is the ‘beat’ if there is one?
• What is the duration of the clicking sound in total?: How long does it go on for? Is anything else happening when it stops? Is it always the same total duration or does it change?
• Where, exactly, does the sound come from?: Is it from the speaker or just near the speaker? (Using headphones can be useful to check this.) Do you have multiple speakers attached to your machine? Which speaker(s) does the sound come come from? Which attached audio devices do not emit the sound?
• Do you have an old modem card installed in your machine?  (Unlikely but possible.)
• Some Apple mice have tiny speakers in them to simulate the sound of a scroll wheel – yes, really – so what kind of mouse (or other peripherals) are you using or have near you?
• Are you able to check the cooling fan in your system? (Assuming that it has one, but don’t try and get near it if you don’t absolutely know what you’re doing.)

[Rcoopr]

Hello again.  

I have been trying to recreate the error to answer your questions, but Publisher no longer makes the noises.  I can only guess it may have been some sort of conflict with the other programs running (is that possible?), or some sort of calibration process that only occurs during the first few runs of the software?  I will try again over the next few days to see if I can recreate the error.

If you would like to hear the exact sound, you can go to control panel>sound and under the sound tab, scroll down the Program events list until you find 'start navigation', click on the test button underneath and it will playback.  It is a.wav file and so the sound came from the speaker.

The sound was not definitely hardware related /caused by mechanical error.

The beat was two clicks, a pause, somewhere around 10 clicks (0.5second intervals), another pause, then another 8 or so clicks, then more pauses and clicks.  That's all I can remember before it annoyed me enough to close the window.  I repeated this three times to confirm it was actually the publisher software that was causing it.  As I said earlier, now I cannot repeat the behaviour, but I will keep testing.

[Rcoopr]

On 5/20/2019 at 5:35 PM, Jon P said:

Bit of a stab in the dark, but if you go to Help > Welcome and untick "Show this panel on startup" at the bottom left, then close/re-open the app does it still happen?

I suppose it may have been something to do with mouseclicking sound effect for the browser window / web content on the splash panel? 

[GarryP]

Definitely a strange one this.
Windows 10 doesn’t have a default sound for Start Navigation but I found the sound in the list so I think I know which one you are talking about.
(I tried enabling the ‘Start-up Splash Screen’ on Publisher 1.7.312 but I can’t get it to make that sound with the ‘Start Navigation’ event sound enabled.)
I can’t see any reason why Publisher should be emitting any sound by itself, other than causing Windows to make the sound by activating something or causing an event to happen.
The pattern you’ve given is curious but I can understand why you didn’t make any more detailed analysis of it; I think it would annoy me too. It’s reminiscent of something making a connection with something else and causing a physical relay or something to activate during a handshake - e.g. an initial quick burst (maybe a ‘transmission’), then a wait for acknowledgement, then a longer burst (a ‘reply’ perhaps), then another wait, then another burst (a ‘confirmation’ perhaps) – but I could just be putting two and two together and making 22.
Have you checked to see if any other event also uses that sound? Some kind of accessibility feature perhaps? Or maybe a device connection/disconnection, a battery alarm, or even some kind of power-usage/resource-pressure alarm. (I’m clutching at straws now.)
The only other thing I can advise at the moment is to make sure that all of your drivers are up-to-date and you have good anti-virus software running. (I don’t want to scare you but it’s normally best to do that anyway.)
I’m afraid I’m a bit stumped on this one for now but maybe someone else – an Affinity developer perhaps, even if it’s to emphatically state that Publisher does not make sounds itself – can shine more light on it.

[Rcoopr]

Yes I think you are right - a developer who is familiar with the start up sequence might already have some insight as to why this may have occurred.  I mentioned it because it was enough to put me off using the software, now that the clicking has stopped it's fine to use.  If I can get the symptoms to repeat I will post again.  Until then thank you for your help.

[GarryP]

You’re welcome. I’m glad it’s gone away, hopefully for good.