The weird little symphony you never knew existed

February 21, 2016 • 3:30 pm

by Grania

This is a whimsical track put together from Windows XP and 98 audio sounds – the dings and clicks the Operating System plays when commands run or don’t run as luck and the laws of physics would have it.

I don’t know the original source. I found it on Computers Are Sad Too tumblr.

Click on the white arrow to play.

https://computersaresadtoo.tumblr.com/post/138362535171/xp98-remix

15 thoughts on “The weird little symphony you never knew existed

  1. Actually, with a kiddo long and long an adult whose career in Atlanta is that of a programming guru and who, at age three along with his older brothers before him, continued his appreciation of music (begun in utero) via the Suzuki method of piano instruction, that ‘piece’ is truly quite lovely !

    Blue

  2. Anyone remembers Soundtracker, and Protracker on the Amiga? Same principle as in the video, i.e. tables where you fill in notes. You would also used a fixed sound which through pitch change allows you to play melodies. I wasn’t very geeky but such creative things interested me.

  3. That’s good. XP lives on. I have an old computer with XP that I use some. Was the best windows I think and then they screwed up.

    1. XP was the best windows. Had the best interface too. I’m not a MS fan but I could live with XP. (When they introduced Windows 7 or 8 or summat at work, with that ghastly semi-transparent screen with the smeary colours, I wasn’t happy till I found the click to revert to the ‘classic’ interface).

      98, on the other hand, used to crash with monotonous regularity.

      My laptops all have XP on them (it was on them when I bought them), downsized to a partition somewhere in case I ever need to use Windows. But I don’t let it near the internet because if it gets a virus I have no way to reinstall it.

      cr

    1. Well, to achieve tonality and something we’d call a melody, the sounds haven’t simply been used “as is”. They’ve had their pitches adjusted to give the composer whatever particular pitch s/he wants that sound to…sound at. The composer has simply put together a bunch of tracks that s/he played on a synthesizer. It’s just that the synthesizer only has Windows sounds available.

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