4

As mentioned here, the first 10.8.5 upgrade made the camera unavailable for Skype. This being totally unacceptable to me, I applied the fix that was around on macrumours, I backed up the AppleCamera.plugin under /Library/CoreMediaIO/Plug-Ins/DAL/, deleted it, and put the 10.8.4 version of the file there. This fixed it until yesterday, when I applied the second 10.8.5 update. The update didn't complain about anything, but now the camera doesn't work again. I've tried using the backed up file, the 10.8.4 again, and the new version that a friend who didn't apply the fix got from the new update (which I didn't). His AppleCamera.plugin is 2.3MB in size, while mine is 2.2MB or 2.4MB (backed up / 10.8.4).

I'm sure everyone who applied that fix is now with the same problem, but I can't find anyone mentioning anything anywhere. Help!

|improve this question
  • What if you restored your system to the point where it was at 10.8.5 before you made the modification and re-ran the patch? – bmike♦ Oct 8 '13 at 11:49
  • I'm not using time machine. Is there any other way to restore the system? I'm relatively new to mac. – bluehallu Oct 9 '13 at 15:02
  • 1
    The recovery HD lets you restore the OS. I would set up Time Machine now so that you can make a backup of your user files, settings and documents - then you can restore knowing you have a good backup now. – bmike♦ Oct 9 '13 at 18:01
  • Reinstall the 10.8.5 than run the Supplemental update. Also read this: support.apple.com/kb/HT5815 – Ruskes Oct 9 '13 at 18:41
  • In "System Report" do you have the camera information showing up? I tried the same workaround as you did and then after applying the latest update camera stopped working for me too. In hardware info it says "No video capture devices were found". – Geos Oct 16 '13 at 11:09
3
+100

So, if I understand correctly, you did these steps:

  1. Upgraded to 10.8.5
  2. Found the camera didn't work in Skype
  3. Backed up /Library/CoreMediaIO/Plug-Ins/DAL/AppleCamera.plugin
  4. Put AppleCamera.plugin from 10.8.4 in its place
  5. Camera worked
  6. Upgraded to 10.8.5 Supplemental Update
  7. Camera broken again

The Supplemental Update does include a copy of AppleCamera.plugin (see below), so one quick thing to try:

  1. Put your copy of AppleCamera.plugin from step (3) back into place
  2. Download the 10.8.5 Supplemental Update again. You can get it as a DMG file from Apple DL1686
  3. Re-run that update (double click the .pkg file in the DMG)

By the way, you can see what files are contained within the update: double click the .pkg file, then choose File > Show Files from the installer.

Some of the files in 10.8.5 Supplemental Update

|improve this answer
  • 1
    now that's a clear answer with instructions :) – Ruskes Oct 9 '13 at 19:53
  • Yeah that's exactly what I did. Will try your solution later, I didn't know updates could be downloaded and applied separately, so this makes a lot of sense. If it works I'll accept it :) – bluehallu Oct 10 '13 at 12:56
0

The safest route would be restarting your Mac from the Recovery Partition (hold Command+R at startup) and reinstall OS X. You need an active internet connection, but you get a full install of the last available OS version in one step. Then you should download and install a fresh copy of Skype.

More info about OS X Recovery: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4718

The general idea is: if an OS update breaks an application, the best course of action is waiting for the developers to fix it. Also, I would recommend using Time Machine: it is not perfect, but it is a quite convenient safety net should anything like this happen to you again.

|improve this answer
  • Sorry but I'm totally not reinstalling the whole OSX just to fix the camera. I understand what the safest way is, but when your job requires you to use videocalls you can't just go and tell your superiors Apple broke your driver and you're not going to be able to do videocall for god knows how many days... – bluehallu Oct 16 '13 at 20:52

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .