You weren't, umm, smoking anything interesting before heading to bed, were
you? ;-)

      -Dave McGuire

On Fri, 02 Jul 1999, Mason Loring Bliss wrote:
>My computer, twice now, has started playing some sort of tune. Spontaneously.
>Seemingly out of the machine's internal speaker. (i386)
>
>The first time, it seemed to be playing "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star." And
>just now, it started playing something more complex. (It would be catchy,
>even, if it wasn't bugging me out so much.)
>
>I'm going to read current-users tomorrow, and if....
>Wow. It's doing it again.
>
>This is *so* freaky...
>
>Has anyone running the setiathome client seen this? That's the only thing
>that's running that doesn't normally run.
>
>Hm... A little kill -9 later, and it's no longer running. Let's see if this
>phantom music returns, sans setiathome. While it was playing, I didn't see
>anything unusual running.
>
>FWIW, spkr0 exists and is built into my kernel.
>
>NetBSD acheron.middleboro.ma.us 1.4D NetBSD 1.4D (MLB) #0: Sat Jun 26 11:12:45 EDT 1999     root@acheron.middleboro.ma.us:/usr/src/sys/arch/i386/compile/MLB i386
>
>Um... I guess I'm not going to send-pr this. FWIW, things I've verified:
>
>1) It's coming from the PC speaker, and not through the sound card, so it's
>not using /dev/audio.
>2) I'm using a fairly standard BIOS. I don't think it uses music to warn me
>of anything. (I *did* just go through a power outage, which is why I mention
>this.)
>3) No one but me is logged in.
>4) No one but me has cron doing anything. I see not at jobs queued. lastlog
>shows no one but me for a while.
>5) It is, actually, coming from the computer - punching the power button
>ended the music. :P
>6) I have no unusual ports open.
>
>Okay. I'm going back to sleep now. (I was woken up to the strands of "Twinkle,
>Twinkle" coming from my box. Hm... Thinking about it, maybe the music was
>first playing while there was a memory check going on... I don't remember
>exactly, as I was half-asleep and staring blearily at my machine from across
>the room, wondering what the heck it was doing. I don't know.)
>
>I think I'm going to swear off Intel hardware entirely someday soon.
>
>-- 
>    Mason Loring Bliss  mason@acheron.middleboro.ma.us  They also surf who
>awake ? sleep : dream;  http://acheron.ne.mediaone.net  only stand on waves.