Noise in Open-Plan Computer Rooms

Abstract

Noise in open-plan computer rooms and annoyance associated with it was reported to be a problem in a large service organization. An experimental investigation was undertaken to determine noise levels in this organization's computer rooms. The noise spectrum was found to be similar in all facilities investigated but substantially different from those of open-plan offices. Fifty percent of all respondents rated the noise level (on a 25–point scale) between extremely annoying and unbearable and intolerable; 10% of the respondents considered the noise very annoying; 20% of the respondents considered the noise levels moderately annoying; the remaining respondents did not seem to have a major problem. Conversational sound and computer-printer beeping sounds were reported to be most annoying by 90% of the respondents who considered the noise levels annoying.