Does your computer play snatches of Beethoven melodies whenever it wishes? It seems some do, and if yours doesn't, it may one day.

I learned about this oddity while reading a commentary by noted computer answer man Brett Glass. One of his readers got so frustrated by being unable to turn off his PC's random playing of Beethoven's "Fur Elise" that he cut the wires to the system's internal speaker. Amazingly, Glass had the answer to hand, and following his pointer I found the Diamond Flower Electric Instrument Company, a Taiwanese manufacturer of popular computer motherboards. The basis of many clone PCs, their boards use something called Damage Free Intelligence to alert users to certain hardware-related problems, such as overheating, or a faulty power supply.

For reasons known only to DFI's programmer, the problem signal emitted is Beethoven's "Fur Elise." Apparently, this alert is either not well documented in DFI's manual, or perhaps not well translated. Or many users simply don't RTFM (read the "funny" manual). See details at DFI. Glass solved his reader's problem - but left me wondering: what the heck does Beethoven's "Fur Elise" sound like? Musical readers may wince, but I couldn't recall the melody.

What to do -- ransack my collection of 1000 LPs (yes, LPs, having only my computer CD-ROM to play the few music CDs I own), or test my Internet research skills by finding a reference on the Web? Querying my favorite search engine led me to the Beethoven Audio/MIDI site, where I found, not a reference, but a MIDI file of "Fur Elise" itself! I had long heard about MIDI (musical instrument digital interface, or computer-synthesized music), but avoided it, thinking it a specialty of teenage rock fans.

My prejudice having left me ignorant of an entire field of computing, I had no idea how to hear this music, for which I was now salivating. Plunging fearlessly ahead I double-clicked the "Fur Elise" link, and up came Netscape's Plug-in Finder, offering a variety of MIDI players. Who says the Internet isn't easy to use?! I selected and installed Crescendo. A few minutes later I was listening to the strains of "Fur Elise" - only to discover that it was the overplayed, but hypnotic, melody that Schroeder plays in the Peanuts tv cartoons. Now hooked, I spent the next several hours exploring MIDI sites of all sorts, classical, jazz, blues and country music.

But, as is not uncommon with new toys, I was hungry for more, and more "real" music. I remembered that I had long ago downloaded RealAudio, though rarely used it, and then only for Internet interviews with technology personalities. RealAudio (or RealPlayer, as its newer versions are called, because they now offer streaming video as well as sound) can reproduce recordings of "real" music over the Internet. RealAudio's site, offers a free download of the player, and links to many music sites.

Unfortunately, because of the recording industry's foolish paranoia about piracy, real music is offered only in bits, pieces and snatches. But, as background music for Internet time I find MIDI music quite satisfying.

Eat your heart out, Schroeder.

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