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The Sleep Machine

Machines that make noise don't generally encourage restful sleep.

But engineers have begun making amends for the cacophony of lawnmower engines and construction equipment that have stolen so many snoozes.

Bedside devices that emit sonorous, sleep-inducing sounds — from trickling rivers to new age music — are becoming an increasingly popular bit of gadgetry on night tables.

Modern Day Counting Sheep

The DreamWave Sleep Enhancement System from Brookstone ($175 U.S.), for example, is billed as "a revolutionary, drug-free way to get a better night's sleep."

The device consists of two egg-shaped white speakers and some sophisticated pre-programmed sounds designed to slow brainwave patterns and lull your overactive mind into a Zen-like state. The sounds are pleasant enough. There's an instrumental option that could double as soundtrack for a Lord Of The Rings movie, "celestial" sounds, nature and the ocean.

With any of these choices you can add a male voice gently enticing your eyelids closed with lines such as, "Let's prepare for a deeper journey to a place of restful and relaxing sleep."

It's a bit like listening to NPR radio at night. Any effort to resist a coma is futile.

The sounds, developed by Dr. Jeffrey Thompson, a neuroacoustic researcher and founder of the California-based Center for Neuroacoustic Research, seek to "coax your mind into an optimal state for deeper, more restorative sleep all night long." Testing the accuracy of such a claims is, of course, an entirely subjective exercise.

Do Sleep Machines Work?

As a member of the constantly exhausted club, my sleepless mind serves as a typical subject for high-tech sound therapy. We begin by placing the speakers on either side of the bed or on opposite night tables for full stereo impact. Tones in the sounds actually vary between the two in ways that you can't hear but apparently help in the knockout process.

Choose from the four sound options, all of which may make you feel like you're sauntering through the local Body Shop store at first. One tip: The ocean sound, featuring gently cresting waves in rhythmic succession, may require you to visit the washroom several times throughout the night. And the nature sounds will feel familiar to anyone who has grown accustomed to falling asleep to TV white noise at the end of the programming day.

So, does it actually induce restful slumber?

Well, it rendered me unconscious faster than a Mike Tyson right hook to the right lobe.

Compared with a typical night of tossing, turning and waking up at 3 a.m. in moments of panic over the fate of Brad and Angelina, I sawed serious logs and awoke requiring only two cups of coffee to think clearly rather than the normal five.

Sam Fields