The Vista sound

by on November 13, 2006

I’m sure it drives many of the geeks crazy in the industry that so much attention is being paid to four little notes. The Associated Press has the story — nice to see Steve Ball get some attention, he’s one of the truly great guys at Microsoft. But, I find it fascinating. I wish I had the videotape I did of Robert Fripp in Microsoft’s studio. But it’s in a big box somewhere inside Microsoft.

  • The first three notes sounds like my speakers are about to crack. Whenever I get Vista, I will be changing that...unless you can no longer change sounds...
  • Russ Henry
    No waaaaay you are going to let them lauch that stupid sound.

    Do this simple test. Put some other pleasant (lol) elevator style music as background noise for distraction. Bring in a small group of people(Not MSFT biased folk), crank the volume on your laptop and start this sound clip. Watch the people in the room cringe in pain.

    Go back to the drawing board and concept out just what feelings you are looking to enduce and start over.

    Try it. Just a thought.
  • "I’m sure it drives many of the geeks crazy in the industry that so much attention is being paid to four little notes"

    No, it seems pretty much par for the course for this release of Windows. Lots of fluff, and 18 months? Pull the other one.

    If I were Fripp I would go find a deep hole to hide in.
  • Sam Davyson
    That is horrible! I think the Windows XP start up sound is much better. But even that is quite hated.

    There is no real need to have a startup sound on by default. Especially not when it is so horrible.
  • Roger Lancefield
    Michiel wrote:

    > If I were Fripp I would go find a deep hole to hide in.

    Yeah, but think how well-appointed that hole will be, and will he be laughing all the way to it?
  • I'm a mac user most of the time, so this doesn't affect me. I'm not defending this sound, but folks, the main reason it seems painful is that the Associated Press's file is compressed and distorted. I could be wrong, but I'd be willing to bet the actual wav file sounds better (though still not something I'd want to hear every time I turn on my machine). Robert, you've heard it, right?
  • Didn't you have that on Channel 9 at one point. I could have sworn I remember seeing that. Am I just off my rocker?
  • It sounds like someone put a mic next to a speaker and did a bad job on the recording. To me, the internal sounds on Vista are quite delicious.
  • emi
    I agree with Bryan Peters :)
  • Bart
    These posts remind me of a saying I've heard, and probably you have too:

    "Opinions are like a**holes. Everyone has one, and everyone thinks everyone elses stinks."
  • And now for something completely different... it looks like ValleyWag has jumped the shark. Scoble, if you don't TechMeme this bad boy, we'll be weeping. This is your story to take to the top.

    http://www.valleywag.com/tech/housekeeping/vall...
  • John: I filmed Fripp twice. The first video was on Channel 9. The second one never made it on there.

    The audio in Vista is a lot better quality than what the AP had.

    But, they had a lot more choices that I liked a lot better. Microsoft should have given us the top 10, not just one.
  • It's interesting that so far I've only been able to find coverage of this on media player - I would like to hear it but as a Mac user I need it on quicktime and yet Microsoft doesn't seem so keen on trying to convert me. That's missing a marketing trick I think.
  • Diego
    Over at Charles Petzold's blog he talks about the Vista sound being similar to a section of another tune.

    http://www.charlespetzold.com/blog/2006/11/1306...
  • Gary
    Did they ever fix the hard-coded start-up sound "feature?"
  • Keep this in mind...
    In addition to the actual sound being better on the actual speakers and the raw file, the audio stack was changed in Vista and should be an improvement over the 10 year old stack.
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