2010 MBP + Lion + SSD = Speakers Failing?

[JKK photography]

So, I have a problem. About once every three times I reboot my Pro, the speakers don't work. The sound status slider in the menu bar is greyed out. Trying to increase the volume simply shows the Volume pop-up also greyed out.

I can fix it, but only by plugging in headphones and then removing them. That's fairly simple except I don't always have headphones on me.

I haven't been able to research it super thoroughly, although some threads on Apple's support forum seem to suggest that this is in fact a logic board issue. Is that right? I do have the warranty still, and I'd love to get this taken care of before it runs out.

This has started happening after one of the following: Installing a Kingston SSDNow V+ SSD, installing more RAM, or installing 10.7.1 combo update. I can't say which it started after, since I did all of those very close to each other.

I have reinstalled Lion when I upgraded to the SSD, as well as resetting the pram.

Any thoughts/suggestions?

 

[treestar]

I have two thoughts. Old MacBooks used to have a hardware issue where the optical port hidden inside the headphone port would activate and cause the internal speakers to turn off. This was easy to check in the past as the optical port would be active, shining a red light inside the headphone port. Inserting headphones was a rudimentary fix for this issue. Do you see this red light when your internal speakers aren't working?

Second thought: you did something to disrupt the integrity of the audio signal cables when you installed the SSD. This would be especially likely if you removed the optical drive or disconnected extra cables as a precaution.

 

[JKK photography]

I have two thoughts. Old MacBooks used to have a hardware issue where the optical port hidden inside the headphone port would activate and cause the internal speakers to turn off. This was easy to check in the past as the optical port would be active, shining a red light inside the headphone port. Inserting headphones was a rudimentary fix for this issue. Do you see this red light when your internal speakers aren't working?

Second thought: you did something to disrupt the integrity of the audio signal cables when you installed the SSD. This would be especially likely if you removed the optical drive or disconnected extra cables as a precaution.

thanks for the quick reply.

As for your first idea, it isn't that. There is no red light in the headphone jack, and the optical drive isn't engaged.

As for the second, that's what I was thinking. However, I did open it up again and check. I've never removed the optical drive, or really done anything besides flipping the hard drive out and replacing it.

I should also add that 10.7 didn't seem to have this issue; I didn't download the 10.7.1 update for at least three days, and this problem wasn't present. I'm now leaning towards it being software. It might be the thing that pushes me back to Snow Leopard, but I'd like to see if there's any (less extreme...) options.

 

[treestar]

As for your first idea, it isn't that. There is no red light in the headphone jack, and the optical drive isn't engaged.

The red light is a tell-tale sign and you haven't experienced that symptom, but to be clear it has nothing to do with the optical disc drive. The headphone jack is actually a dual mode output that can also send a digital optical signal of an optical fibre cable.

 

[JKK photography]

The red light is a tell-tale sign and you haven't experienced that symptom, but to be clear it has nothing to do with the optical disc drive. The headphone jack is actually a dual mode output that can also send a digital optical signal of an optical fibre cable.

Oh alright. I see what you mean.

So what do you think? A reinstall of the OS? I suppose that the next step...

 

[TonyTurboII]

I just installed a SSD and am experiencing the same issue. As far as moving my info, using an external dock I booted into recovery and used disk utility to clone the OEM Drive to my ned drive, a Crucial M4.

Did you end up finding a fix for the problem?

Everything Im reading online is related to the older models outputting red lights. Its becoming a major annoyance, happens almost every time I boot the computer.