How To Disable Sound Themes In Windows 7

A sound theme is a set of sounds applied for each event like system startup, shutdown, errors and many others. They are useful at times and also very annoying many times(especially alerts of common mistyped key strokes and mouse clicks).

I use to mute system sound to get rid of the annoyance but just learnt that there is a better way to disable these sounds .

If you are also annoyed like me and decided to turn off sound themes here are the steps to be followed in Windows 7:

1. Right click on the empty are of desktop and choose the option Personalize

2. Scroll to the end of the Personalize Window and click Sounds  link

how_to_disable_windows_sound_themes_1

3. Select No Sounds from the list of Sound Scheme options and click the OK button.

 how_to_disable_windows_sound_themes_2

5. That’s all. All the Windows alert sounds are disabled now.

29 thoughts on “How To Disable Sound Themes In Windows 7”

  1. I did this and it didn’t work. I still get a stupid “ding-dong” notification sound. I hate windows 7. I want XP back!

  2. Moe’s guides don’t work on Windows 7 Home editions. Only the business/enterprise versions.
    Apparently, the gods at MS have decided those of us at home will continue to hear sounds.

  3. Hi, Thanks for the post. It really helped me i was in so much trouble to find out what is making that annoying trumpet noise. I could figure out its not skype or facebook but notification and you helped me with disabling that. so thanks for the same..

  4. Hope this work for more than one day. Starting to go nuts really. How did they think when they added sound to open maps as default. Starting to really hate windows…..seriously.

  5. Also can someone describe why Outlook gives sounds even after I say “no sounds” as my system setting? Is there something else i need to do?

    Thank you.

  6. Here’s how to do it permanently, since the fix above is temporary, until you change the theme:

    run policy editor (gpedit.msc…must have admin permissions)
    user configuration
    administrative templates
    control panel
    personalization
    Enable the ‘prevent changing sounds’ policy.
    WARNING: be sure to set your sound scheme to what you want BEFORE implementing this policy, as it will preserve the current settings.

  7. This only works for the current theme. Once you change to another theme, you’ll need to disable the sounds manually again.

  8. It would be nice to eliminate those annoying sounds. I hope the fix works. Considering the comments, maybe it won’t.

  9. Thank you for this clear and precise writeup. This helped me in doing what needed to do, which is to finally eradicate those annoying sounds in Windows 7!!!! :) Cheers.

  10. Way to go, dude! Thanks! Now, can you help me get my quick launch bar back to it’s usual useful self? I add folders in xp and works great. Win 7, cant do it unless you attach to Explorer. Pain in the arse!

    Thanks again,

    Susan

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