Geoff -- If you're not able to get the desired results using Esther's great instructions, here's an idea that falls somewhere in-between fixing it yourself and having sighted assistance. Since you now have an iPhone 4S, this means you also have the ability to make Facetime video calls. Perhaps you could initiate such a call with a sighted person who has a facetime compatible Mac or iDevice, aim your iPhone's facetime camera at the screen of your Mac, and let the person on the other end give you visual feedback as you work your way through to system prefs to select the correct output device. I think this also might be possible using the latest version of Skype for iPhone, but I'm not positive of that.
HTH, Bryan On Oct 20, 2011, at 10:24 AM, Esther wrote: > Hi Geoff, > > Do you have a test account set up on your MBP that you can log into? You > stated "I get sound output through the headphone jack only but as soon as I > log on it stops. Resetting the pran restored my start-up sound, but the > problem persists." Resetting the PRAM as Bryan suggested fixes system wide > sound problems. Since you lose sound upon logging into your account, I'd > suspect that one of your preference files may be corrupted. One way to check > that out is by logging into another user account on your machine and checking > to see whether the same problem occurs there. If it doesn't, then you know > that it's likely to be due to something individual to your account's setup -- > most likely a corrupted preference file. I create a user account on my Mac > just to use for testing whether problems or changes in behavior arise due to > my local account settings or whether these are due to system-wide behavior. > > Do you only have the recovery partition, or do you also have a bootable clone > of your setup under Lion? If you have a clone that you made with Carbon Copy > Cloner or SuperDuper! after you upgraded to Lion, you can attach that drive > and boot up a working system from your clone. Just hold down the option key > when you power up. What will happen is that you'll be presented with a > choice of boot volumes to use for startup, with your regular hard drive > selected by default. VoiceOver won't be speaking at this point until you > actually boot, but if you press your right arrow key followed by the return > key, you'll switch to the next bootable volume and start up from there once > you press return. If you only have one other bootable disk attached it > doesn't matter whether you press the left or right option key to switch to > the clone, however, some people buy one large disk, partition it, and put all > their clone backups onto a single drive. Apart from the possibility of a > single p oi > nt failure, you'd have to keep track of the number of times you press the > right or left arrow key to determine which partition you were selecting > before pressing return, and you'd only be able to identify the partition you > got by checking the contents after boot up. So in that case you would have > to keep notes, only press either the right or left arrow key, and count the > number of key presses that would get you to a particular bootable partition. > > I would try to check whether the sound problem exists by booting into another > account on your machine. If you don't have another account created, but you > have a working bootable clone of your system taken at an earlier time, I > would attach that drive and boot up from there by holding down the Option key > when powering on, then pressing Right arrow and the return key after waiting > for 15 seconds or so for the drives to be recognized. Once your clone drive > is booted up, you can log in and check things out. You can also access your > main Macintosh hard drive and its files. My guess is that you want to copy > over a file named "com.apple.systempreferences.plist" from your user account > on the clone to replace the file that you changed when you were > experimenting, but you can also copy this over from the Library/Preferences > folder of another user account where this is working. Maybe you can get this > from the recovery partition? Or you can try moving this from the default > location i > n the Library/Preferences folder of your account, and check whether the > default settings (to use your internal speakers) are restored when the > preference file is recreated. Someone who has access to the Lion setup can > probably tell you more. > > Apart from creating another user account on my machine to test problems. I > usually store a copy of my recent preference list files in a separate > location on my machine. I don't need to know which ones these are by name -- > all I need to do is use the Finder Command-Shift-G "Go to folder" shortcut > and type in: > ~/Library/Preferences > Then in Finder's list view mode (Command-2) I'll sort on the "Date Modified" > column and pull off the most recent 100 files or so and copy them to another > location. Since plist files are small, this doesn't take up much room. And > the files that are frequently modified are the ones most likely to get > corrupted. > > HTH. Maybe someone with access to the Lion recovery partition can give you > more suggestion about doing everything from the recovery partition, but I > don't think you need to reinstall or get sighted help to recover. > > Cheers, > > Esther > > On Oct 19, 2011, at 20:46, Geoff Waaler wrote: > >> Hi Bryan and list, >> >> Thanks for the tip!! It really did help, though the saga continues. >> >> While investigating my problem I went to system preferences -> sound and >> apparently selected a different device. As a result sound is no longer >> emitted from the speaker or headphones. I get sound output through the >> headphone jack only but as soon as I log on it stops. Resetting the pran >> restored my start-up sound, but the problem persists. >> >> I booted my recovery disk via command+r, and VO did emit output through the >> MBP speakers. I repaired and verified permissions, but this proved to have >> no affect. At least I know that my speakers are functioning. >> >> Google results primarily point to the microswitch issue I've seen on the >> iPhone, however the fact that my speakers function normally in recovery mode >> would seem to render that solution inapplicable? >> >> Will I need sighted help to go into preferences -> sounds, or is there a way >> short of reinstalling Lion that I can recover? >> >> Thanks in advance and best regards. >> Geoff >> >> >> ----- Original Message ----- >> From: Bryan Jones >> To: Mac OSX & iOS Accessibility >> Sent: Wednesday, October 19, 2011 10:28 PM >> Subject: Re: Muted MBP speaker. >> >> >> Hey Geoff, >> >> Have you tried resetting the PRAM? You can read more about this in the >> following apple KB article. If this resolves your issue you can thank Anne & >> Archie Robertson as they are the ones who turned me on to this nice little >> troubleshooting trick. >> >> http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1379 >> >> HTH, >> Bryan >> >> On Oct 19, 2011, at 5:19 PM, Geoff Waaler wrote: >>> Earlier today my out of warrantee mid 2010 13 inch MBP was functioning >>> normally. I left it powered up and unattended for a few hours. There were >>> no electrical storms and my MBP did not experience any spillage or shock. >>> Now, sounds are only emitted through the headphone jack -- I don't even >>> hear the initial power-on tone, which would seem to suggest a hardware >>> failure. >> > > <--- Mac Access At Mac Access Dot Net ---> > > To reply to this post, please address your message to > mac-access@mac-access.net > > You can find an archive of all messages posted to the Mac-Access forum at > either the list's own dedicated web archive: > <http://mail.tft-bbs.co.uk/pipermail/mac-access/index.html> > or at the public Mail Archive: > <http://www.mail-archive.com/mac-access@mac-access.net/>. > Subscribe to the list's RSS feed from: > <http://www.mail-archive.com/mac-access@mac-access.net/maillist.xml> > > The Mac-Access mailing list is guaranteed malware, spyware, Trojan, virus and > worm-free! > > Please remember to update your membership options periodically by visiting > the list website at: > <http://mail.tft-bbs.co.uk/mailman/listinfo/mac-access/options/> <--- Mac Access At Mac Access Dot Net ---> To reply to this post, please address your message to mac-access@mac-access.net You can find an archive of all messages posted to the Mac-Access forum at either the list's own dedicated web archive: <http://mail.tft-bbs.co.uk/pipermail/mac-access/index.html> or at the public Mail Archive: <http://www.mail-archive.com/mac-access@mac-access.net/>. 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