PC speaker -- beeper -- is a built-in loudspeaker in most personal computers since the first IBM PC. This speaker is not capable of high quality playback and merely serves as a simple means of auditory feedback in the form of beeps. Some software -- e.g. web browsers, editors and terminals -- may produce beeps which may or may not be desired by the user. This article serves as a guide for configuring and/or disabling the speaker entirely.
For situations where no sound card or speakers are available and a simple audio notification is desired, see #beep.
The PC speaker is typically a physical unit connected on the front connections header of the motherboard. Some motherboard manufacturers do not ship their motherboards with a PC speaker at all, whereas others may have the PC speaker soldered directly onto the surface. Laptops typically have no physical PC speaker but have the beeper routed to the laptop internal speakers. In some cases, the beeper is heard on the regular output -- i.e. speakers or headphones -- of the soundcard, which tends to be unexpectedly loud.
Upon boot the UEFI/BIOS will traditionally generate a beep during power-on self-test (POST). Recent motherboard models omit the POST beep in favor of rapidly booting into the operating system. The UEFI user interface typically allows for toggling the POST beeps but it cannot configure the PC speaker to be turned off completely.
Once the system has booted into Linux and the kernel module is loaded, the PC speaker can be used by the environment, be invoked manually by the user, and be configured to some extent.
Because the PC speaker is controlled directly by the CPU, along with the fact that they are built for beeping only, PC speaker cannot be used for playing back audio files. If this is really desired, unloading the module and installing the snd-pcsp-dkms package provides a rudimentary audio output.
By removing the PC speaker the system will not be able to produce beeps. This can be achieved by physically removing the unit from the motherboard (if possible). Some manufacturers may provide a jumper header to switch it off.
To unmute the channel, see Advanced Linux Sound Architecture#Unmuting the channels.
Add the same line to the [Settings] section of :
This is documented in the Gnome Developer Handbook.
Bell notification settings can be modified in System Settings > Accessibility Options > Bell.
beep(1) is a PC speaker beeping program. beep is useful for situations where no sound card and/or speakers are available, and simple audio notification is desired.
The following rule will allow any user, who is logged into the currently active virtual console session, to use the PC speaker:
Previous solution does not allow to use beep for users logged in remotely -- e.g. via OpenSSH, -- or processes running as any user other than the one logged into the currently active virtual console session. Alternatively, a new user group may be created with the corresponding rule to set the right permissions on the device file. With this solution any user in the group will be able to control the PC speaker:
To force reloading rules and device file to apply new user permission without a reboot, execute:
The PC speaker might remain silent when the HD Audio sound card is in power-saving mode. Apparently -- depending on hardware -- the beeps are actually fed as an analog input into the card, and will be ignored if the card is asleep. You can debug this by playing music (to keep the card awake) in one virtual console and then beeping in another.