Longtime Verge readers might remember the peculiar incident involving Janet Jackson’s music video, "Rhythm Nation," which caused certain Windows laptops to crash. This issue, once a surprising footnote in tech history, has been revisited by Microsoft employee Raymond Chen in a recent blog post highlighted by PCWorld. Back in 2022, Chen recounted a story shared by a Microsoft colleague about a problem faced by an unnamed "major computer manufacturer." It turned out that specific frequencies in the "Rhythm Nation" music video resonated with the hard drives in laptops, leading to operational disruptions that could cause the operating system to crash. This quirky issue was severe enough to earn an entry in the NIST National Vulnerability Database, affecting 5,400rpm hard drives in certain machines "from approximately 2005 and later." To address the problem, the manufacturer implemented a custom filter for audio playback that reduced the impact of these disruptive frequencies. Chen, curious about the longevity of this workaround, recently followed up on the story. He discovered that the filter persisted until at least Windows 7. When asked in the comments if the filter is still present, Chen responded, "All I know is that it was there in the Windows 7 era. I don’t know if it’s still there." However, the industry has largely transitioned from spinning disk hard drives to solid-state drives (SSDs) and other non-mechanical storage solutions. As a result, modern computers are much less likely to be affected by the same issue, making it safe to enjoy "Rhythm Nation" without fear of system failure. This anecdote serves as a reminder of the unexpected ways software and hardware can interact, highlighting the ingenuity required to solve unique technological challenges.