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I cannot hear any audio from my MacBook Pro, running OS X 10.7. Pressing F10/F11/F12 shows the volume overlay, but it stays at max volume with a (/) icon below it. In the Sound control panel or from the sound icon in the menu bar I can adjust the volume, but the Mute checkbox is greyed out. Rebooting does not resolve the problem.

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This is all good information and helped me zero in on what my problem is but, the fix is not consistent. Sometimes I can fix the problem and most times, I cannot. But, I noticed that [with my Macbook at least] the problem occurs when the battery power is low (like below 48%). As long as I keep my Macbook charged, high, I don't get the problem re-occuring. Has anyone noticed the same? – John C Mar 31 at 13:31

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up vote 7 down vote accepted

The headphone jack had a red LED glowing inside, which clued me in that it thought there was an optical cable plugged in. Plugging and unplugging a pair of headphones resolved the problem.

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I've had the same issue on my machine once. Possibly a bit of dust or something making contact, shortcutting the jack socket. Putting a jack in and back out usually works wonders. – Joost Oct 17 '12 at 17:31
Canned air might do the trick. – DogEatDog Oct 17 '12 at 17:40
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Feel free to tick this answer as solving your issue if you don't need other answers trying to help solve this problem – bmike♦ Jan 3 at 19:44
up vote 3 down vote

What I did was keep my headphone jack plugged in while turning up the volume (F12). Then, while I was turning up the volume I pulled out the headphone jack. This fixed it.

It almost seems as if I tricked it. I read a few other posts where you do this in the volume audio panel but those solutions did not work for me.

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The same thing happened to me but I found a solution and it should work. It's an easy solution so read carefully.

  1. Turn off your MacBook.

  2. When you turn on your MacBook a grey apple appears on the screen - before that grey apple appears press these keyboard buttons Command + Option + P + R (hold the keys at the same time).

  3. Hold they keys until you hear the sound you usually hear when you turn on your MacBook the second time.

The MacBook should be fixed.

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