How does a transformer make clicking sounds when being powered ON or when it is bucking/boosting voltages, without having any moving parts inside?
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Well, because depending on how you want to think about it they do have moving parts. Buck/boost converters use coils around a ferrous material, transformers are slightly different but similar. When current flows through it it creates a magnetic field which exerts a small amount of force. This usually causes the parts to “move a bit”. The mosfet or silicon doing the switching may also make some noise, that I don’t have an explanation for. Transformers in substations hum at the sound of the AC frequency of the main lines, in the US this is 60hz. For a buck/boost controller I’m guessing we hear an octave (is that the right term?) because they usually operate 10’a or 100’s of kHz which we can’t hear.
A buck/boost controller won’t have literal moving parts like a relay because the switching speeds are way too high.
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