3100: Alert Sound
| Alert Sound |
 Title text: With a good battery, the device can easily last for 5 or 10 years, although the walls probably won't. |
Explanation
|
This is one of 52 incomplete explanations: This page was created recently by a BOT THAT GOES BOOP. Don't remove this notice too soon. If you can fix this issue, edit the page! |
"Living well is the best revenge" is a quote attributed to George Herbert. As is semi-common for Randall, he has taken this quote literally, and decided to disagree with it.
Most computers play sounds to notify users of various events, such as a device being connected. Randall proposes placing a small noise making device in the wall of a room that a computer is typically used in. Because the noisemaker is programmed to periodically play a "device connected" sound, this would cause concern for the occupant of the room. If someone hears such a sound when they're not expecting to, it's cause for concern, especially if it happens often.
The title text makes an estimate for the battery life of a device that only activates every 6 hours at the most, and then jokes about the lifespan of the wall in which such a device would be set. The joke being, of course, that user plagued by this sound will soon start tearing down walls trying to find the source of the sound.
Transcript
|
This is one of 27 incomplete transcripts: Don't remove this notice too soon. If you can fix this issue, edit the page! |
[Cueball is sitting at his desk with a computer, surprised by a "Boop!" sound in the upper left part of the panel]
Cueball: AAAAA!
Cueball: I heard it again!
Cueball: Where is that coming from!?
[Caption below the panel:]
It turns out living well is only the second best revenge. The best revenge is making a tiny hole in someone's wall and dropping in a battery-powered capsule that, every 6-12 hours, plays the alert sound of a USB device connecting
Add comment 
Create topic (use sparingly) 
Refresh Discussion
https://www.amazon.com/Funny-Pranks-Annoying-Noise-Maker/dp/B08KG6XHN1
The reviews are hilarious. 47.248.235.170 21:35, 9 June 2025 (UTC)Pat
- Damn, someone beat me to it. If it didn't exist I was gonna make one and call it the "Randall 3100" aka "Black Hat 3100." 70.115.234.146 23:14, 9 June 2025 (UTC)
- I think the original may be the Annoyatron, from Thinkgeek. I find references from 2007. Jordan Brown (talk) 23:35, 9 June 2025 (UTC)
Most smoke alarms are approximately 3100 Hz (the comic number). I wonder if this comic is a reference to the annoying low battery chirps from smoke alarms that can be difficult to locate. 2A09:BAC3:6227:1232:0:0:1D0:B9 00:49, 10 June 2025 (UTC)
- Smoke alarms are supposed to be a lifesaving device, so WHY the hell to they chirp at such a wide interval?! If it was once every 10 seconds at least you'd be able to tell where it was coming from. And it gets even worse if you're in a public or apartment building with over a dozen of them. 24.177.125.170 06:51, 10 June 2025 (UTC)
- But chirping that regularly would deplete the remaining battery much more quickly, potentially leaving the device dead before anyone was around to hear it.82.13.184.33 08:21, 12 June 2025 (UTC)
Devices like this but employing high frequency chirps have been around for at decades, notably from the specialty police and military supplier Shomer-Tec 71.36.121.121 03:44, 10 June 2025 (UTC)
Could a somewhat ‘living’ well dug on the ground the second best revenge in the joke? 物灵 (talk) 10:19, 10 June 2025 (UTC)
- Ni shi zhongguoren ma? Wo shi meiguoren, but I think I misread "living well" the same way as you did. "well" as in "好", not "井". I was imagining some kind of horrifying well made out of meat. 205.185.98.6 18:05, 14 June 2025 (UTC)
Is this a reference to a previous XKCD? This feels to me strongly like I've seen something similar before, but I can't recall where. 2A02:5080:185D:FD9E:0:0:931:5001 11:19, 10 June 2025 (UTC)
- Maybe you’re thinking of 1241: Annoying Ringtone Champion? Intara (talk) 12:17, 10 June 2025 (UTC)
Shades of the TellTale Heart. 192.183.232.193
A few years ago, I found that my laptop computer appeared to be beeping for about a minute every midnight. Somebody suggested to me it could be a smoke detector, but I eliminated that. Finally, I discovered that my weather station base station, which was positioned behind the laptop, had an alarm that had got switched on, default time midnight.--2A00:23C7:6700:9001:48C1:DEA:EA61:D57 09:40, 11 June 2025 (UTC) Add comment
