ON WINDOWS AND MACS LAUNCHING WITH SOUND

SILENCE IS GOLDEN

There's a fairly long, geeky discussion thread on Techmeme this evening on Windows Vista having a start-up sound that cannot be turned off by users for "branding" reasons.

This has been the way it is (to my knowledge), on current Windows XP AND Mac OS X based systems.

My two-cents on this echoes the majority of the posts and commenters to Robert Scoble's original post on the subject.

Let the user turn off the start-up sound on their computers...PLEASE.

There are countless times every user has wanted to turn the darn thing off, because we don't want to disturb and/or startle other people in both professional and personal settings.

Computer companies, both Microsoft AND Apple need to get this through their marketing-addled heads, and respect their customers by providing this simple but essential change.

End of Rant/Request.

P.S.  I feel the same way about video clips on web pages starting with audio and video WITHOUT a proactive action by the user...see my earlier post on this annoying and growing practice.

Comments

[eawilson]

I think it might be easier to just use the "mute" feature. I'm not sure about Windows users; but, if I have the mute button on when I shut my Powerbook off, it starts up silently next time.
However, I do know what you mean by disturbing others with the annoying chime.

[Innerdaemon]

eawilson is right. If you mute on any Mac the machine boots silently until the volume is turned on again. Not so on windows, xp or otherwise