Your laptop just makes the familiar “oh-oh” sound. You know you have an instant message in ICQ.
The problem is, it’s 5:30 in the morning right now… Indeed you forgot to turn off your speaker the night before.
It doesn’t have to be like this.
The one last time this happened to me, I decided to fix this problem once and for all. So I wrote a command line utility that lets me mute and un-mute my computer speaker. Couple this with the Task Scheduler in Windows, my laptop knows when to keep quiet. 
Usage: cmdmute [0|1]
0 - Mute OFF
1 - Mute ON
Toggle if no argument is given.
Update on 2007-01-30: Source posted. Compile it with cl cmdmute.cpp winmm.lib
Update on 2008-11-11: I use this only on Windows XP and I don’t have Vista for testing.
Update on 2008-12-23: I heard that nircmd works on Windows Vista.
12:39 on September 21st, 2005
So I was going to google to find out if there was some command I can run to mute the speaker. I didn’t think I’d find anything, let alone an actual application that can easily be put into Windows Tasks. Excellent script! Thanks a lot!
- Adam
19:11 on November 11th, 2005
Great job!
11:59 on June 22nd, 2006
Thanks for the util.
One step better would be if the command could be used to report the current setting. That way a script that needs to mute could not unmute if it was mute before the script runs. Maybe:
cmdmute check
0:47 on August 27th, 2006
Great program. Thanks.
2:51 on October 20th, 2006
I have a shared computer in my office and I really want the sound off, while most of my colleagues like the sound on.
A shortcut to your file in the startup folder and everyone can set his preference. Great! (thanks to google)
4:59 on January 11th, 2007
Great thing, many thanks to the author! But also could you share the secret - I mean, the original script source?
12:54 on January 22nd, 2007
Great App. I chucked it into a batch script wich runs each time i log on to mute my laptop. No more IM noice in lectures…
its a simple shortcut on my start menu to unmute it when i want things back on again.
Thanks!
19:12 on January 30th, 2007
No problem. See the update above.
1:09 on March 20th, 2007
Sweet this is exactly what i was looking for
thanks!
1:13 on August 9th, 2007
Sweeet!! This is what i was looking for. Thanks for the utility and sharing the code too
Cheers
/\/ishanth
9:10 on April 4th, 2008
I was about to write my own, just wanted to check did anyone make it before… I downloaded it, still didn’t check it, but i’m sure it works
Thanks!
0:53 on May 30th, 2008
Thanks for this nice application mate. Very sweet indeed. Thanks loads.
11:01 on July 27th, 2008
thanks so much!
very appreciated your open-minded
6:10 on August 9th, 2008
Great File man. Can i add a mirror file on my site? It would be bad if the human world will lost this great small tool.
9:47 on August 22nd, 2008
Please let me know how to use it. I M a new user. and I do not hv much knwledge
Thanks
9:16 on September 25th, 2008
It doesn’t seem to work in Vista… It doesn’t complain, and says muting is on, but the sound is still on.
9:23 on September 25th, 2008
I found a tool that is able to mute/unmute the sound in Windows Vista. It can also do many other nice things, like changing the volume, opening the CD tray etc.
http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/nircmd.html
16:54 on November 8th, 2008
Great tool! This is perfect when I’m trying to listen to music over the media center and my 5 year old refuses to turn the sound down on his PC that’s in the same room
16:04 on November 12th, 2008
Could you please post the original command line code?
11:58 on November 16th, 2008
nice job man! keep goin’
10:31 on November 28th, 2008
This is what i’m looking for, ver big thanks!
17:37 on December 16th, 2008
Hi,
Great app mate! I have windows vista. I have tried running this after putting the app in System32 folder…it doesn’t work. Am I doing something wrong?
Please advise.
- Tushar