Please Help | Inexplicable System Event Sound!

[jdkinslow]

Lately an "unknown system event" triggers an audible sound to play on my iMac 27 inch, running High Sierra 10.13.6. This audible sound is generated even though, in the sound control panel, I've unchecked the boxes "'Play user interface sound effects' and 'Play feedback when the volume is changed?'

After the above steps failed to prevent the sound, I opened a terminal window and executed the following command: "defaults write com.apple.system sound "com.apple.sound.uiaudio.enabled" -int 0", intended to terminate/prevent any and all system sound generation.

Still, the sound persists.

Reviewers should know this problem persists both before and after a full fresh (hard drive reformatted/partitioned) install of High Sierra 10.13.6 (the latest OS my iMac is capable of hosting). Buying a newer Mac is not an option.

The two attached screenshots represent system event errors logged at the moment this sound generates:

The first illustrates a logged error timestamp of 17.23.55.581156, continuing unbroken into the topmost timestamp of 17.24.08.414082, on the second screenshot. I've also generated and attached a fresh EtreCheck Report.

Please consider the following:
1) Can anyone explain the specific computer processes or instruction "fails" responsible for generating this sound? What can I do to *correct these process fails?
2) The only way to fully mute the sound is to mute the computer. Not a viable or acceptable option as I use this computer for business work, calls, etc.
3) Could the system sound be generated as a result of a "connection" or "pairing" between my iPhone 7 Plus, and the iMac. In other words, could there be a process, sourced from my iPhone, responsible for generating these system event errors and subsequent sound - on my iMac?
4) How is it that the iMac can generate an audible alert (at all), given preventative steps taken above?

Can anyone help me diagnose and provide a solution?





View attachment EtreCheck Report (05-13-2020) (2).pdf

 

[ferrarr]

About the only sound I can think it may be, is what I consider to be the "Not Allowed" sound. Sometimes I get it when I'm trying to adjust the volume, but the sound is not coming from the system, but speakers connected to the headphone jack.

 

[MacInWin]

The two images are too fuzzy to read. From the Etrecheck report, you don't need to run Clean My Mac as a resident process, just run it as you think you need it. That should improve performance overall. You also have Objective-See running (LuLu), which is not needed. There are no active viruses for the mac operating system. One or both of them might be generating the noise. Finally, you have uTorrent running, which is again not needed until you use it.

So, I would remove those three from the login items, or un-install them, or at least not allow them to run constantly. Constantly running stuff lilke this can cause all kinds of strange issues.

 

[jdkinslow]

I appreciate the reply.

To your point re: fuzzy images. I'm guessing that resulted from my forced resizing (c/o mac-forums) of the original image(s). Originals were at like 1912x????. Mac-forum forced a resized to 800x???.

I'm fairly confident the audible sound (best described as a "digital plop"), I know that sounds strange, is directly related to "WindowsServer" errors logged at the precise time the audio is heard. Hence the importance of my providing clear console log screenshots. I'll remove Etrecheck, Clean My Mac, and uTorrent as resident processes and determine if the issue is resolved, but given my belief of the relationship between the "WindowsServer" error, specifically:

"error 11:50:03.809683 -0400 WindowServer [ERROR] - Unknown CGXDisplayDevice: 0x41dc9d00"

I'm not confident these three programs are at fault. Apologies. I should've provided this precise error in my first post but I didn't anticipate the support images not being readable.

Would your guidance change given the precise error shared in this reply?

 

[jdkinslow]

@ferrar

Thanks for your thoughts.

See my reply to MacInWin (if you can) and let me know if you have other advice?