iPhone 4S no sound except ringtones works

I have had this problem for a while. Have tried almost every posted tip that I´ve found surfing help forums.

My Iphone indeed thought that it was docked to a usb speaker or similar. No volume bar and the symptoms where the same that most of you have. It got me wondering what would happen if I connected the Iphone to my receiver that has a USB-port for docking the iphone to it, and then when playing some music disconnect the iphone. Voilá, suddenly it started working.

I had the same problem, tried all the different suggestions on this forum and others no avail. Too it in too an Apple Store, they appeared like they had dealt with this problem before. After i told him what the symptoms were, he took the phone to 'test' it. Came back and said i had a 'docking port failure' and replaced my phone for me.

So, it appears you can't fix it (well with mine anyway) and need to replace it.

This is crazy almost everyday I need to do a hard restart to get my phone to work, Is there a way on going back to ISO 5.0. Ive done almost everything but a restore which I do not want to do. Unhappy camper here.

I found that my phone was locked into dock mode, just sprayed compressed air into the charge cable area and presto working for over a day now.

My 4S had same symptoms. After trying everything here (hard resets, etc.) I simply took the phone to my boom-box with iPhone docking station...let it play a moment of music. Now my tones work again, I have a volume bar again.

Wish I'd had time to take it to the iStore and get them to give me a new phone though!

Hope this helps somebody!

Well THAT was the shortest-lived fix ever...after the first notification, back to vibrate only. Maybe I will make that trip to the iStore....

Bugger!

I had the same problem and it happened after having my phone for only 3 weeks. I took it to the Apple store this weekend. The Apple Genius took it to the back and then after 3 minutes came back and showed me with a spy glass that the white tab in at the bottom of the phone (inside it) by the speaker was showing red which meant my phone had water damage. He said for this to turn red it would have had to be sitting in a pool of water for some time. I have never once in the 3 weeks I owned this phone dropped it in water or left it sitting in a puddle of water. I don't even take it into the bathroom when I'm showering. Anyway, the tech said there are 3 tabs throughout your phone and since only one was showing red they would replace it for free, otherwise it would have cost $200 for a replacement. While I'm glad I got my new phone and the sounds all work, I'm frustrated that this turned out to be the problem when again, my phone has never come in contact with any water. I really wonder if I was sent a refurbished phone or something. Also makes me wonder what happened in the back room where I couldn't see what he was doing with my phone. Anyway, maybe that's the problem you're having too. Have the Apple people check it out if you haven't already.

It's not recommended to use compressed air to clean a dock. It could very well void the warranty. See the "iPhone user guide" bookmarked in Safari for more info

DIRECTIONS FOR THIS FIX:

1) Jailbreak the iPhone (use Redsn0w for iPhone 3G, 3GS & 4 and iPad 1; use Absinthe for the iPhone 4S and iPad 2). For iOS 5.1 a tethered jailbreak is currently only available but that's good enough to perform this fix.

2) Download and install 'iExplorer' (link below). It's available for both Mac and PC

http://www.macroplant.com/iexplorer/

3) Connect iPhone to your PC/Mac and run iExplorer

4) Within iExplorer, on the left column navigate to System / Library / LaunchDaemons

5) Within the right column find 'com.apple.iapd.plist', right click then select delete

6) Close iExplorer and reboot the iPhone

7) Enjoy sounds again on your iPhone!

I have had this problem in the past, but with just a couple of contacts. So I simply re-entered those contacts. Today, AFTER I plugged my phone into my 2011 Acura MDX, my tones were not playing once I unplugged it from the car. I went back into the car and plugged it in, unplugged it, plugged it back in (you get the idea), and eventually all of the tones came back. I had to take my son's phone out there and send myself test texts until it worked again. This might be helpful for someone who connects their iPhone to the car.

Legend moneyzoom worked a treat used ifile instead deleted file restarted iPhone and boom glorious sound. Thanks man

Awesome, Blueloony. You fix worked for me. I never even knew there was AssistiveTouch, and I have no idea how I got into this mute mode. But your fix worked!

Try this:

Settings>General>Accessibility>AssistiveTouch>Toggle AssistiveTouch On

you'll notice a "white ball" on your screen (aka AssistiveTouch)

Touch the white ball>Device>Mute>Unmute (nd result should make your iPhone unmute)

now try.

im facing the same problem but unfortunately i guess my iphone is out of warranty about one month, can i still claim??? :((((

After searching on the net, found the problem to be the dock connector, My dock connector had a little bit of damage, changed same ( purchased off ebay about £5) Now working fine again. Took mw 10 mins start to finish.

Relatively easy repair.