macbook air - no sound

Yesterday while watching a video on youtube, my audio stopped working. In fact, the hardware (sound device) was no longer visible nor was the speaker icon on the menu bar.

I read through this thread (http://discussions.apple.com/thread....art=0&tstart=0), and tried the safe mode reboot. It worked. Sound came back. Watched another video and same thing happened. This time, the Safe mode reboot didnt work, but clearing the audio cache via Onyx did. Watched another video, same thing. Safe mode didnt work, Onyx didnt work, but PRAM reset did. Watched another video, same result. Now nothing works. WTF?

The thread suggests a hardware problem (ribbon cable or board itself). Seems doubtful to me since some of these workarounds actually worked.

Any thoughts?

Any recent MAC updates...sounds like a driver issue to me

MLF

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sounds like a driver issue to me

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I agree. I am current. IMHO, it's an update that caused the problem. ;)
It's worked fine for almost 2 years now.

Looks like I will need to enter the Time Machine. I'll be back...

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Any thoughts?

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Stop watching videos. :D

lol. Yeah, I suppose I set myself up for that one. :p

Hi Ron,

From your post it almosts sounds as if the problem is progressive?

I would be inclined to run the Apple Memory Diagnostic and check the system battery.

Sure it could be an update, but I would expect the problem to appear immediately afterwards, and be consistent, even if you had to apply the same workaround each time you used it.

:confused:

Have you upgraded to 10.5.8? If so, how long afterwards did the problems start?

Ron:

I'm not a Mac User as I can't afford one, though I'm trying to get a Mac Book Pro, but I read somewhere that Mac has a tool similar to "GoBack" that allows you to basically monitor a Hard Drive, and if something happens, you can revert the drive back to a mirror image of it when things were working.

Windows ME sort of had this, XP had this but not nearly as good as the commercial "GoBack" version which allowed you to pick and choose which parts of a set date and time you wanted to revert too all the way down to which files you wanted changed and which ones you wanted to stay with.

That may be one option, but it seems strange that viewing YouTube would cause this. And I don't go for that Hardware problem with a cable since software fixes have worked as you said.

Any problems with normal Audio? It may seem like a stupid question but there seemed to be an implied sense of YouTube only Sound Screw.

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run the Apple Memory Diagnostic and check the system battery.

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I tried the memory diag as well as the more comprehensive hardware diag. Nothing.

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Have you upgraded to 10.5.8? If so, how long afterwards did the problems start?

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Yes, shortly afterwards.

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similar to "GoBack"

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It's called Time Machine. westin is onto something. I checked my backups and there was a very large update to 10.5.8 the day before the problems began. The problem is that the audio device is no longer recognized. Hence, no sound regardless of app.

I am trying to restore to a backup from before the OS update. Gotta boot from remote disk via wireless (no dvd on macbook air), then do restore. Slow.....

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Originally Posted by Cheap Scotch Ron

Gotta boot from remote disk via wireless (no dvd on macbook air), then do restore. Slow.....

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Ohhhhh man i feel sorry for you, so i'll have another :drink: to help heal the pain. :p

i've had to do a restore via wireless. and i got bored pretty darn quickly. took 4 tries but i eventually got the kinks sorted.:argue:

Installing older version of OS did the trick. Also noticed other 10.5.8 users complaining about last week's update.

http://discussions.apple.com/thread....sageID=9958491

Ha....I knew it ;)

Figured it was an update that knocked it out...although my kids havent complained of issues...yet. They both have MAC notebooks...the small ones.

I must say they are fantastic machines those MACs...very impressive the lack of issues we have with them.

MLF

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Installing older version of OS did the trick.

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Not exactly... It worked for most of the day. No updates since restore.
No sound again... @#$%!!!!

WTF...Thinking maybe it's a loose cable. Gonna tear it open in the morning.

This is going to sound REALLY weird at first, but umm, do you by chance have good speakers? Sound Waves can actually cause physical motion inside a case, and in particular, Bass, when played through properly, can even help destroy a hard drive, so to a sound card, I imagine moving a wire, or making it jiggle a bit, wouldn't be out of the question.

Do you have good speakers that are near it? Or, do you play an instrument at all ? They don't have to be in the same room, I was for a while playing with one of my amps and found a way to screw with a couple things from almost a block away by playing towards them.

Of course, for all I know, you may have dropped it, or someone else may have, causing a wire to pop loose just a hair to cause intermittent outages.

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do you by chance have good speakers?

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No. I dont use external speakers on my mac. I use the internal speakers. However, I occassionally use my ipod headphones, but they dont work either.

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Of course, for all I know, you may have dropped it, or someone else may have, causing a wire to pop loose just a hair to cause intermittent outages.

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Possible. Gonna investigate

Think drop is the most likely cause right now. Internal speakers, though gaining in quality compared to just a few years ago, aren't generally powerful enough to do any damage.... Which it wouldn't make sense if they did considering any who turned their speakers up all the way would destroy stuff lol.