No mail sound after 10.7.2

Here's an easier fix for this annoying problem. Hope they fix it in Mountain Lion.

Open the app audio MIDI setup. Run it and choose the Built-in Output tab on the left. In the right-hand Format dialog, change it to any other setting and back to what it was.

All you sounds since they became trapped will come through the speakers and you'll be OK until they get trapped again somehow. I lave the icon for the Audio MIDI Setup.app on my desktop so I can do this whenever I notice the mail sounds have gone away.

Thanks, chazcone. The "Format" area is just one line in the right pane under the line that says "Source:" (after which mine says "Headphones", which makes no sense). If you change the drop-down from something like "2ch-24bit Integer" to "2ch-20bit Integer" momentarily, it will indeed break the logjam and play queued sounds.

This is more convenient than the method I posted, unless you are comfortable making a shell script to kill and restart Core Audio.

As for fixing it in Mountain Lion... I wouldn't hold my breath. This bug has persisted for at least six years now.

Maybe we're on different of OS X? I'm on 10.7.4 and the Audio MIDI Setup screen looks like above.

Using the arrows to the right, I choose 2ch-32 bit float and then back to 2ch-16bit Integer and the sounds come zipping out of the speaker.

I apologize if that isn't responsive to your comment, Stokestack, but I just tried to help.

Chaz

Hi Chaz. No problem; that's the same screen I'm seeing. I just wanted to clarify the description a little, because I spent some time looking for the "Format dialog" until I saw that it's just one label on one control.

I'm going to add this setup utility to my Dock as you have. Good suggestion. It's pretty ridiculous that this is still broken.

Regards,

Gavin