How to Change the Event Sound Effects in Windows 7 and Windows 8
Information
This tutorial will show you how to change the sounds applied to events in Windows and Programs as a Sound Theme for your user account in Windows 7 and Windows 8.
Note
Windows 7 and Windows 8 uses .wav (wave) files played for the sound events.
The default folder that Windows 7 and Windows 8 uses to store the sound files in is located at C:\Windows\Media.
Tip
For fun and sharing, you can post the sounds that you use at this link if you would like to.
OPTION ONE
To Change Sound Events in "Sounds" Dialog Settings
1. Do step 2, 3, or 4 below for how you would like to open the Sound dialog.
3. Right click or press and hold on the Volume (little white speaker) system icon in the notification area at the bottom right corner area of the taskbar, click/tap on Sounds, and go to step 5 below. (see screenshot below)
OR
4. Right click or press and hold on a empty area of the desktop, and click/tap on Personalize. (see screenshot below) NOTE:The Windows 7 Starter and Windows 7 Home Basic editions do not have Personalize included in them.
B) Click/tap on the Sounds link at the bottom of the Personalization window. (see screenshot below) NOTE:The name in gray under Sounds is the current sound scheme selected.
C) Close the Personalization window, and go to step 5 below.
5. Click/tap on the Sounds tab, and do step 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, and/or 11 below. (see screenshot below)
6. To Turn the Windows Startup Sound On or Off
A) Check (on) or uncheck (off) the Play Windows Startup sound box, and click/tap on Apply. (see screenshot below step 5)
7. To Change an Event Sound
A) Click/tap on a listed Program Event (middle section) to select a sound event, and do either step 7B or 7C below. (see screenshot below step 5)
B) Click.tap on the Browse button. (see screenshot above) NOTE:The default Windows sound files are located in the C:\Windows\Media folder.
Navigate to and select the .wav file that you want to be used as the sound played for the event, click/tap on Open. (see screenshot below)
Click/tap on Apply. (see screenshot below step 5)
OR
C) Click/tap on the Sounds: drop down menu at the bottom, select a sound that you want to be played for the event, and click/tap on Apply. (see screenshot below)
8. To Test Play a Sound
A) Click/tap on a Program Event that you want to hear the current sound set to be played for the event, and click/tap on the Test button. (see screenshot below step 5)
9. To Change a Sound Scheme
A) Click/tap on the Sound Scheme: drop down arrow menu, select an available sound scheme you want, and click/tap on Apply. (see screenshot below)
10. To Save a Sound Theme NOTE:This is useful to have all your event sound changes saved as a Sound Theme to be able to select in step 9 above.
A) Click/tap on the Save As button. (see screenshot below step 9)
B) Type in a name you would like for the sound scheme (theme), and click/tap on OK. (see screenshot below)
11. To Delete a Saved Sound Scheme NOTE:You cannot delete the No Sounds, Standard Default, or Windows Default schemes, only the ones that you saved.
A) Click/tap on the Sound Scheme: drop down arrow menu. (see screenshot below step 9)
B) Select the sound scheme that you want to delete, and click/tap on the Delete button. (see screenshot below step 9)
C) Click/tap on Yes to confirm. (see screenshot below)
11. When finished making changes in the Sounds dialog, click/tap on OK . (see screenshot below step 5)
OPTION TWO
To Change Sound Events in Registry Editor
1. Press the Windows + R keys to open the Run dialog, type regedit, and click/tap on OK.
2. If prompted by UAC, then click/tap on Yes.
3. In regedit, navigate to the location below. (see screenshot below) NOTE: In the left pane under Apps, each subkey (folder) .Default (Windows), Explorer (Windows/File Explorer), and sapisvr (Windows Speech Recognition) contains sound events under those categories just like in Sounds from OPTION ONE above.
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\AppEvents\Schemes\Apps
4. In the left pane of regedit, expand the subkey for the sound event (ex: MailBeep for "New Mail Notification") that you want to change what sound is play for it to expand it. (see screenshot above)
5. In the left pane under the expanded sound event (ex: MailBeep), select the .Current key. (see screenshot below)
6. In the right pane of .Current, double click/tap on (Default) to modify it. (see screenshot above)
7. Type in the full path of the unblocked.WAV file that you want to be played for this sound event, and click/tap on OK. (see screenshot below)
8. Repeat all of the steps above in OPTION TWO for any other sound event that you wanted to change what default sound is played for it.
This information help me to easily modify sound effects for Windows 7.
What I could not discover, was how to change or modify the little bleep that one hears when Window loads-up to the log-in page, where the password is entered to enter Windows 7.
I looked throught the sound information and found nothing thnat would change this. I must have overlooked something.
How do I alter or change the "sound effect" that is play just prior to the initial log-in screen?
I there any way to export a sound scheme for transferring it to another computer? Not the whole theme, which will also include the sounds. I need to transfer only the sound scheme or save it for future use.
System Manufacturer/Model Number Built to order OS Windows 7 Pro x64 CPU Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Quad CPU Q6600 @ 2.40GHz Motherboard Gigabyte P35-DQ6 Memory mushkin DDR2 PC2-8000 Total 8.00 GB RAM Graphics Card NVIDIA GeForce 9800 GX2 Monitor(s) Displays Eizo FlexScan S1910
The actual sounds in a scheme are located here: C:\Windows\Media\<SoundSchemeName>, where <SoundSchemeName> is the name of the Scheme¹. Save this folder with the same name as that of the Scheme¹.
They are referenced in the Registry as shown in the code below:
Copy and paste the above code into Notepad and, using the Edit/Replace... function, replace all occurrences of <SoundSchemeName> with the actual scheme name¹. Save this file with a .reg extension, giving it the name of the scheme¹.
You can now place this file, together with the actual sound files, onto a USB key or other storage device. To replace/restore this information, simply copy the sound files saved previously to C:\Windows\Media and the merge the .reg file into the Registry. If you want other users to also be able to use these sounds, you will need to merge the .reg file separately for each user.
System Manufacturer/Model Number Dwarf Dwf/11/2012 OS Windows 7 Ultimate x64 Service Pack 1 CPU Intel Core-i5-3570K 4-core @ 3.4GHz (Ivy Bridge) (OC 4.2GHz) Motherboard ASRock Z77 Extreme4-M Memory 4 x 4GB DDR3-1600 Corsair Vengeance CMZ8GX3M2A1600C9B (16GB) Graphics Card 2 x AMD Radeon HD7770 1GB CrossFired (OC 1100MHz/1250MHz) Sound Card Realtek High Definition on board solution (ALC 898) Monitor(s) Displays ViewSonic VA1912w Widescreen (VGA) Screen Resolution 1440x900
Keyboard Microsoft Comfort Curve Keyboard 3000 (USB) Mouse Microsoft Comfort Mouse 3000 for Business (USB) PSU XFX Pro Series 850W Semi-Modular Case Gigabyte IF233 Cooling 1 x 120mm Front Inlet 1 x 120mm Rear Exhaust Hard Drives OCZ Agility 3 SSD 120GB SATA III x2 (RAID 0)
Samsung HD501LJ 500GB SATA II x2
Hitachi HDS721010CLA332 1TB SATA II
Iomega 1.5TB Ext USB 2.0
WD 2.0TB Ext USB 3.0 Internet Speed NetGear DG834Gv3 ADSL Modem/Router (Ethernet) ~4.0 Mb/s (O2) Antivirus Avast! 7.0.1474 Browser IE 9 Other Info Optical Drive: HL-DT-ST BD-RE BH10LS30 SATA Bluray
Lexmark S305 Printer/Scanner/Copier (USB)
CTF-430 Tablet & Pen
WEI Score: 7.7/7.9/7.4/7.4/7.9
Asus Eee PC 1011PX Netbook (Windows 7 x86 Starter)
Guys thanks for your advice. Based on this information I did the following:
Step 1: you set once the sounds as you like in one computer
Step 2: run-->regedit--> HKEY_CURRENT_USER\AppEvents. You export this key and you save it
Step 3: you make sure that any other computer has exactly the same files in the folder C:\Windows\Media
Step 4: you merge the exported registry key to the computer you wish to transfer the sound scheme
That’s it…
Can you guys verify that I have not messed it up? For me it works just fine.
System Manufacturer/Model Number Built to order OS Windows 7 Pro x64 CPU Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Quad CPU Q6600 @ 2.40GHz Motherboard Gigabyte P35-DQ6 Memory mushkin DDR2 PC2-8000 Total 8.00 GB RAM Graphics Card NVIDIA GeForce 9800 GX2 Monitor(s) Displays Eizo FlexScan S1910
To cut the size of the registry file down even further, you would only need to export the following key:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\AppEvents\Schemes\Apps
Incidentally, there is nothing to stop you creating your own .wav files and placing them in a directory of your choice, so long as the entries in the registry reflect the location of these files. For example:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\AppEvents\Schemes\Apps\.Default\.Default\<SoundSchemeName> @="C:\\<Path to File>\\<SoundSchemeName>\\<SoundName>.wav"
Where <SoundSchemeName> is the name given to the scheme, <Path to File> is the location where you have placed the files, and <SoundName> is the actual name of the individual .wav file.
System Manufacturer/Model Number Dwarf Dwf/11/2012 OS Windows 7 Ultimate x64 Service Pack 1 CPU Intel Core-i5-3570K 4-core @ 3.4GHz (Ivy Bridge) (OC 4.2GHz) Motherboard ASRock Z77 Extreme4-M Memory 4 x 4GB DDR3-1600 Corsair Vengeance CMZ8GX3M2A1600C9B (16GB) Graphics Card 2 x AMD Radeon HD7770 1GB CrossFired (OC 1100MHz/1250MHz) Sound Card Realtek High Definition on board solution (ALC 898) Monitor(s) Displays ViewSonic VA1912w Widescreen (VGA) Screen Resolution 1440x900
Keyboard Microsoft Comfort Curve Keyboard 3000 (USB) Mouse Microsoft Comfort Mouse 3000 for Business (USB) PSU XFX Pro Series 850W Semi-Modular Case Gigabyte IF233 Cooling 1 x 120mm Front Inlet 1 x 120mm Rear Exhaust Hard Drives OCZ Agility 3 SSD 120GB SATA III x2 (RAID 0)
Samsung HD501LJ 500GB SATA II x2
Hitachi HDS721010CLA332 1TB SATA II
Iomega 1.5TB Ext USB 2.0
WD 2.0TB Ext USB 3.0 Internet Speed NetGear DG834Gv3 ADSL Modem/Router (Ethernet) ~4.0 Mb/s (O2) Antivirus Avast! 7.0.1474 Browser IE 9 Other Info Optical Drive: HL-DT-ST BD-RE BH10LS30 SATA Bluray
Lexmark S305 Printer/Scanner/Copier (USB)
CTF-430 Tablet & Pen
WEI Score: 7.7/7.9/7.4/7.4/7.9
Asus Eee PC 1011PX Netbook (Windows 7 x86 Starter)
I have indeed created my own sounds and to remember their paths I just create a directory under C:\Windows\Media and put them there. By exporting the key HKEY_CURRENT_USER\AppEvents\Schemes\Apps you miss the names of the schemes, while exporting the key HKEY_CURRENT_USER\AppEvents\Schemes you also get the names of the sound schemes.
I have always wanted to export my custom sound scheme and I would have never figured this out without your advice. Thanks
It looks that manipulating the registry is the only way to customize the windows. Wish I new more tricks!!!
System Manufacturer/Model Number Built to order OS Windows 7 Pro x64 CPU Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Quad CPU Q6600 @ 2.40GHz Motherboard Gigabyte P35-DQ6 Memory mushkin DDR2 PC2-8000 Total 8.00 GB RAM Graphics Card NVIDIA GeForce 9800 GX2 Monitor(s) Displays Eizo FlexScan S1910
Information
Note
Tip
OPTION ONE 
How To Prevent Theme Change from Activating Windows Sounds 
