Audio Problem with 2012 MacBook Air and Thunderbolt Display

i concur with cseal...audible static develops with or without peripherals attached when playing audio with 2012 11" MBA and TBD.

i'm hoping that the upcoming release of Mountain Lion will magically resolve what seems to be a software issue, but I won't hold my breath just yet. i'm reticent to swap out any hardware or invest a lot of my personal time and energy troubleshooting the issue with AppleCare support, as the problem seems widespread enough that Apple should in theory be able to confirm the existence of a problem and indicate that a solution is being developed based on in-house troubleshooting/testing. has anyone shot an email off to Tim Cook on this one?

Thought the same about the Magsafe 2 but:

1. This issue hasn't been reported by MacBook Pro owners.
2. I tried without the adaptor. Same result.

I have a Senior Advisor working on this. I will update people here. I would advise other people to escalate this as I have. The more noise the better. Otherwise, only solution is take back TBD or replace MBA with Macbook Pro Retina.

In my case, it seems to only happen with the Chrome browser. If I close the tab and re-open, it fixes it for a time.

Hey folks,

Just spoke with a Senior Advisor. She told me that there's no way they won't release a software update any time soon. She also told me she has heard this issue more than once so I guess they are working on it.

I really hope Mountain Lion fixes this issue.

"no way they won't release a software update any time soon"....

I can only hope. I've called apple care about 4 times and "no, we have not heard of this being an issue". I am tired of the same old resets.

I am surprised this issue has not caught more attention.

Just got linked over to this thread as well, so I'll pile on.

Brand new 13"MBAir, using magsafe 2 adapter with a thunderbolt display refurb. Less than a week old. Definitely having this issue as well; it is only remedied by restarting the application which is driving the audio (Spotify) in this case.

hope we get an update soon.

Same problem here with macbook 2012 11inch....However the static sound happens randomly after about couple hours. My short term solution is just unplug the thunderbolt display and plug it back in again.

Doing the same, best solution so far...

I have a MacBook Air 2012 13" +TBD

Static noise is occuring randomly.

I'm on Mountain Lion GM. (legally of course!) So no fix there yet.

Better (and less fiddly and time-consuming temporary fix) is to leave Settings open on the Sound widget and simply cmb-tab to it and quickly press up then down on the keyboard (thus selectling Internal Speakers then Display Audio in quick succession). Takes seconds and your hands don't even have to leave the keyboard.

Excellent idea. That you.

Same Problem, Macbook Pro Retina + TB Display/

Will try JofArnold's temporary fix and report back if it works, sounds much less annoying than unplugging everything.

Do you guys use Chrome as your Browser? Figured that this might be the source of the evil.

Same issue here. MBA direct to Samsung Full-HD TV via Thunderbolt->Displayport. Useless for watching movies. First distortion starts then audio disappears.

Has anyone tried installing this update? I found this update on the Apple support page. Software Update in the OS did not pull this up for some reason. I just installed it and everything seems to be working fine. Let me know if it works for everyone else.

MacBook Air (Mid 2012) Software Update 1.0

About MacBook Air (Mid 2012) Software Update 1.0

This update is recommended for MacBook Air (mid 2012) models.

The update includes fixes that improve graphics stability, flash performance, and external display support.