when you think PC speakers you probably think of something that looks like this
but the original PC speaker actually looked more like this the original IBM
PC from 1981 actually had a speaker built into the chassis and unlike modern
computer speakers it would typically only emit a series of beeps and boops
kind of like R2-D2 but without the fun personality and even though many of you
probably aren't old enough to remember using the original IBM PC plenty of
subsequent system featured a similar PC speaker if you remember hearing a beep
coming from your PC chassis when you booted it up that was the PC speaker in
action indeed from the mid 1990s onward
the primary use of the PC speaker was to relay information about system
operations to the user it was common for a beep at bootup to mean that the
computer had passed the power on self test or post while multiple beeps or no
beep at all indicated some kind of error or Hardware problem but prior to the
mid90s the PC speaker was actually used for General sound output music playback
feedback from productivity applications or sound effects NVIDIA games so
similar to the full fat speakers of today just with a much more limited
range of sounds but why was it so limited well most speakers work by
having a diaphragm move from some starting position to some end position
with the movement of the diaphragm pushing the air to make what our ears
register and as sound normally speakers receive analog input a voltage that
tells them how far to move a big wiggle
or a little wiggle the old PC speaker though could be told to either be all
the way in or all the way out quickly
switching between these two positions at a regular interval makes something close
to a single frequency tone and yet this
system could produce a wider range of sounds somehow
we'll tell what clever technique was used to change the notes and create more
complicated music or sound effects right after we thank the sponsor of this video
private internet access their VPN network spans across six continents and
91 countries letting you access your local catalog of content from all over
the globe plus with a single subscription you get unlimited
connections making it easy to run Pia on practically any device we previously
partnered with Pia for years and they just concluded their second security
audit putting further emphasis on your privacy and security so go check out Pia
using our Link in the description for a special deal with a risk-free 30-day
money back guarantee a special technique called pulsewidth modulation or pwm was
used to expand the capabilities of the PC speaker you might be more familiar
with pwm as a method to vary the speed of the fans in your computer but it also
worked well for the PC speaker it worked by essentially applying voltages for
varying lengths of time which resulted in the speaker being told to switch
between in and out faster than it could
physically respond you see it takes time for the speaker to change States between
in and out it's a very short amount of time we're talking far lower than a
millisecond but it still takes time nonetheless so if a signal is sent to
change back before the speaker is fully finished switching States different
kinds of sounds can be produced although the sounds you'd get in many games and
applications were still fairly simple talented programmers could exploit this
method in some games to allow for the playback of more complex music and even
human speech the downside though is that this often put quite a load on CPUs of
the day so not all systems were powerful enough to reproduce the best that the
dinky little speaker had to offer of course once dedicated sound cards
started making their way into PCS taking that load off of the CPU we all started
connecting proper desktop speakers to our computers and the PC speaker was
mostly relegated back to its original role of just beeping at us every now and
then and even that isn't as common these days since modern applications can give
you auditory feedback through you know actual speakers and there are more
robust tools for Diagnostics between Windows features the UEFI and even
indicator lights and led codes on the motherboard itself some motherboards
don't even have headers for an internal speaker anymore but if you really miss
that sweet startup beep you can actually buy an m.2 Gadget that makes a similar
sound which originated from an old NC
pc98 if you can wait for it to be shipped from Japan do you still use the
internal PC speaker in your modern setup let us know down below and if you want
to know why most computers don't come with sound cards anymore go watch this
video next it's pretty good