audio not switching to headphones

[RamarC]

My Toshiba Satellite laptop running Vista no longer reroutes audio from the built-in speakers to the headphones when I plug them in.

At first I thought the headphone jack had fritzed out. But after a bit of twiddling with audio device properties, I discovered that the jack works fine and the active audio device is simply not being switched to the headphones. The headphone device is only displayed in the control panel sound applet when they're plugged in. Once plugged in, I can make them the default device and any apps I open will send sound to the headphones, but system sounds or sound from any open app will still be played through the laptop speakers.

Too bad I'm not still trying to DJ since this would have been handy!

 

[mpilchfamily]

What kind of headphones. If they use the standard headphone audio jack then it should be switching over. When the jack is plugged in it moves a mechanical switch in the plug that disables the speakers and routs the sound to the headphones.

 

[RamarC]

every set of headphones i use and a mini-stereo cable all now produce the same behavior.

the laptop knows something's plugged in because the headphones device is only visible when something's plugged in. this is a software issue, not a problem with the jack.

 

[corkyg]

Originally posted by: RamarC
every set of headphones i use and a mini-stereo cable all now produce the same behavior.

This suggests that the problem is as was stated by MPilch et al. The shorting switch inside of your green Toshiba port is probably broken. It is a simple mechanical strip that gets shunted over by the presence of a headphone mini jack. If that shunt is not there, you will get both speakers and headphones. What it does is to short out the speakers.

If you mute the speakers in software, that may mute the entire port including the headphones.

Your problem has nothing to do with software. The fact that the headphones are detected is normal.

Spkr

 

[RamarC]

thanks for the feedback but you're missing the point.

the PC recognizes that the headphone jack is plugged in. when it's removed, the headphone device disappears.

also the audio for any app opened after the headphone jack is plugged in is *automatically* routed to the headphone jack (since it is the default device). however, any app that was already open will continue to route its audio to the laptop speakers.

so, rather than having one audio device whose output switches from speakers to headphones, i now have two independent audio devices. i'm trying to figure out how to get back to the behavior of one audio device.

 

[corkyg]

Originally posted by: RamarC
the PC recognizes that the headphone jack is plugged in. when it's removed, the headphone device disappears.

Of course! But the headphone jack is not pushing the speaker shunt over - it is either bent or broken.

 

[RamarC]

thanks corky, but a software change fixed the problem.

the audio driver was using a generic Microsoft HD Audio driver. i uninstalled it and installed the latest Realtek HD Audio driver. now when I plug in headphones, the speakers turn off and the audio for all open apps re-routes to them. more importantly, i no longer have seperate Headphones and Speakers devices... i just have Speakers. when i plug in headphones, no Headphone device appears.