No audio in FaceTime?

I am having the exact same problem on my iMac 27". I'll be talking with my daughter, then my audio dissapears and she cannot hear me. Frustrating and embarrasing to say the least. Facetime is the problem no doubt because I too have checked my mic and it's working fine. Come on Apple, get this thing working, Steve would be embarrased at this lame app.

HI,

This issue only seems to effect Laptops as only they have the Ambient Noise Reduction Setting.

Previously this could be "cured" by deleting the com.audioDeviceSettings.plist file from /Library/Preferences

(this is the Library at the top level of the Hard Drive and not the Users Preferences)

This file used to be loose in Leopard and earlier within this Preferences Folder but since Snow Leopard it has been within a separate Audio Folder with some new .plists.

You could try deleting these .plists and restarting the computer.

10:01 PM Sunday; November 6, 2011

Please, if posting Logs, do not post any Log info after the line "Binary Images for iChat"

 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb( 10.6.8)
 Mac OS X (10.6.8),
"Limit the Logs to the Bits above Binary Images."  No, Seriously

I have this problem and I'm using an Intel iMac first edition. My friend is using an iPhone 4.

I don't understand how deleteing a folder can solve the problem if the problem seems to occur after a while using Facetime. For the most part my mic sound works with all the other apps using it on my iMac. System check shows it working fine. It just drops after 5 minutes or so.

Recently a friend having problems with Verizon had them reboot his network and I faced him for about 20 minutes

before the problem started again.

One person responded that they reinstalled Facetime to no avail.

HI,

I did not say delete the Audio Folder.

I did say to delete the AudioDevice .plist which has solved similar issues in the past where different apps seems to have different audio Levels stored for them.

Also there is a bit of a "Known Issue" in iChat with Headsets particularly BlueTooth ones.

These have to be set up in System Preferences > Sound > Input before they are set up in iChat.

(If already set up, set both System Preferences and iChat to any other devices and then set the System Preferences "First")

As Face Time uses the same vcencoder to control Video and Audio then there may be some benefit in "re-doing" the Audio Set up.

9:31 PM Friday; December 9, 2011

Please, if posting Logs, do not post any Log info after the line "Binary Images for iChat"

 iMac 2.5Ghz 5i 2011 (Lion 10.7.2)
 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb (Snow Leopard 10.6.8)
 Mac OS X (10.6.8),
"Limit the Logs to the Bits above Binary Images."  No, Seriously

so would it make sense to Trash Facetime and reinstall it? I guess what I'm refering to is someone's post about reinstalling not making a difference but I believe it was in reference to the beta and just dumping the app didn't resolve it. But there were replies about all the folders that weren't thrown away being the problem.

I can't seem to get over how the sound coming from my mic just quits after a period of time. It seems like a dynamic issue vs. a corrupted folder.

Hi,

It is unlikely to be a "Folder".

It is more likely going to be file or files within a folder.

IF Face Time does this in a test Mac User account (or any other Mac User Account you have you could test in)

Then it will most likely be the Files within the Audio File in /Library/Preferences (those settings held for Everyone)

If it only happens in one User Account then the info will be stored in ~/Library/Preferences (The Users Home Folder/Library.

in the User's Own Library/Preferences folder

The com.apple.imagent.plist holds the info for iChat and Face Time whether the Mic is Off or Not

com.apple.imservice.FaceTime.plist hold no info about mIc or volume.

The com.apple.ichat.plist on my iMac holds a reference to a "microphone gain" Setting but I run a AppleScript to change my Audio Settings on Accepting a Video or Audio Invite so I think it is connected to that.

com.apple.audio.AudioMIDISetup.plist can effect the audio in some apps even if you have no MIDI device connected.

This happens when the sample rate is not set to what the app needs or uses.

For Example USB mics should be set to 44100 for iChat to "See" them them whereas the External iSight needs to be at 48000

If your testing seems to limit it to Face Time in any Mac User account on your Mac then it may be the app or an interaction between the App and the System Preferences > Sound settings.

As for Downloading and reinstalling anything from the App Store I have not yet worked that out.

9:20 PM Saturday; December 10, 2011

Please, if posting Logs, do not post any Log info after the line "Binary Images for iChat"

 iMac 2.5Ghz 5i 2011 (Lion 10.7.2)
 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb (Snow Leopard 10.6.8)
 Mac OS X (10.6.8),
"Limit the Logs to the Bits above Binary Images."  No, Seriously

I just came home for Christmas a & had to see what was going on with my mother's iMac. (If it matters, it's a iMac Intel Core2 Duo 2.8ghz running 10.6.8) My daughter and I always facetime with her on my iphone 4, however over the past couple months it seems we only get 1-5 minutes of facetime before my mother's iMac would mute her, she could hear us (audio from iphone 4) but we could no longer hear her (audio from iMac).

Our solution:

While in Facetime, an additional menu shows up while in a chat - I went to "Video", toward the bottom of that menu appears to be a input selection..By default on her machine, "Line In" was selected. I changed it to "Internal Mic". After doing this I left the connection for about 30 minutes, came back to check, and there was still audio.

Why?

I have no idea why. Internal mic should have been selected by default. Why would it start off working during a chat, then just cut off? Well, in our case, when I went to the mac's audio settings, the peak indicator was still moving...so the mic was receiving, I've seen several other people mention 5 minutes being the magic number they were being cut off at, in my testing, it cut off after a minute on the first test. Sooo, it seems like there must be a bug in facetime, it may be as simple as Mac changing the default selection of audio input source for this machine.

That seems to be useful info.

Thanks for taking the time to post your experience.

11:08 PM Monday; December 26, 2011

Please, if posting Logs, do not post any Log info after the line "Binary Images for iChat"

 iMac 2.5Ghz 5i 2011 (Lion 10.7.2)
 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb (Snow Leopard 10.6.8)
 Mac OS X (10.6.8),
"Limit the Logs to the Bits above Binary Images."  No, Seriously

the first thing I always did when losing my mic on Facetime on my iMac duel core (no 2) was to check my sound levels and they were all where they were suppose to be.

Now today....

I just experienced for the first time on my iPad 2 Facetime losing my voice after about 6 minutes.

I never thought the mobil devise was compromised until now. I just thought it was the app on the imac etc.

So how do you reboot Facetime on an iPad?

I have the same issue on my macbook pro running 10.6.8. At first I went about 20min, then about 5, then 3 sessions around 1 min, now I have no audio out at all. I deleted the mentioned plist files in the Audio folder in library preferences to no avail. The mic still works fine for other applications and shows normal audio levels. Seems to me that somehwere in the code for facetime it keeps some type of running value and its being attributed wrong . So that each session the value changes until you get no sound at all.

Would love to find a fix since I am now calling on the phone while facetiming. Not an optimal user experience.

Hi,

Can I ask ?

Have you updated to OS 10.7.3 ?

This was known to sort an issue with the External iSight's Mic and allow them to be used.

This suggests that the Audio within FaceTime has been looked at.

7:45 PM Thursday; February 9, 2012

Please, if posting Logs, do not post any Log info after the line "Binary Images for iChat"

 iMac 2.5Ghz 5i 2011 (Lion 10.7.3)
 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb (Snow Leopard 10.6.8)
 Mac OS X (10.6.8),
"Limit the Logs to the Bits above Binary Images."  No, Seriously

I am on a corporate machine and they have not yet upgraded us to lion. We are not using external iSights.

HI,

My fault.

I scrolled back a few posts not realising you had only made the one in this thread and spotted an unrelated OS 10.7 item.

In Snow Leopard you get two .plists for iChat and FaceTIme (if you use both.) that are relevant in this situation.

com.apple.ichatAgent.plist holds some info about the Mic and it's Volume.

Adding/installing FaceTime adds a .plist called com.apple.IMAgent.plist which at first glance does not seem to contain any references to Audio.

It does contain some "timeout" references.

At this point I would try deleting com.apple.IMAgent and restart the computer (IMAgent starts when the computer starts up).

The .plist is in your Home Folder/Library/Preferences

Just drag it to the Trash.

8:23 PM Thursday; February 9, 2012

Please, if posting Logs, do not post any Log info after the line "Binary Images for iChat"

 iMac 2.5Ghz 5i 2011 (Lion 10.7.3)
 G4/1GhzDual MDD (Leopard 10.5.8)
 MacBookPro 2Gb (Snow Leopard 10.6.8)
 Mac OS X (10.6.8),
"Limit the Logs to the Bits above Binary Images."  No, Seriously

Hi,

I just discovered this discussion and I'm having the same audio issue with FaceTime on a Mac Pro 2.8 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon, in case any of that info is relevant.

I'm running 0S 10.7.3. I haven't used FaceTime very much, but I recall using it successfully about 6 mos. ago when I was still running Snow Leopard. Just tried yesterday and no audio at all. I also noticed that the mic icon at the bottom of the FaceTime screen had a line through it.

Audio settings in Prefs are fine. Mic shows activity in Sound Prefs. I trashed the suggested plist file this evening and still no sound in FaceTime.

Very frustrating.

Bob