Headphones and external speakers not recognized

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Aiwendil

PCHF Member
Sep 8, 2018
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I recently bought a refurbished Dell Latitude E6440 with Windows 7. The laptop speakers play sound, but when I plug a device into the audio jack, it is ignored and it continues to use the laptop speakers.

When I plug in headphones or external speakers to the audio jack, there is a notification that pops up saying "You just plugged a device into the audio jack", so clearly the jack recognizes that something is plugged in. When I unplug the device, I similarly get a message "You just unplugged a device from the audio jack".

When I go into Realtek HD Audio Manager, I see that under the "Analog" heading on the right, the "Front panel" indicator lights up green when I have a device plugged in, and greys out when I unplug the device. However, the menu under "speaker configuration" is greyed out, as is the "set default device" menu. If I press the play button to test the speakers, I hear sound come out of the laptop speakers, regardless of whether an external device is connected. I've also gone to the "Device advanced settings" and tried both of the options under "Playback device" - "Mute the rear output device when a front headphone plugged in" or "Make front and rear output devices playback two different audio streams simultaneously". Again, regardless of which is selected, sound only comes out of the laptop speakers.

I've tried updating the Realtek HD audio drivers, but it seems that they are up to date.

If I go into "Sound" in Control Panel, under "Playback" I see two devices listed, "Speakers/Headphones" (which is listed as the default device), and "Headphone" (which says "not plugged in"). This is the same regardless of whether a device is actually plugged into the audio jack. It appears that "Speakers/Headphones" is for the front jack and "Headphone" is for the non-existent rear jack.

I also tried disabling audio in BIOS, restarting, then re-enabling audio, as I came across someone with a similar problem who said that this fixed it, but no such luck for me.

Any suggestions? Does it seem that this is a hardware issue? Thanks.
 
Welcome to PCHF Aiwendil,

Can I ask what type of connector jack the headphone and speakers have, two ring or three ring. these are bands on the jack plug that you insert into the port on the notebook and are mainly black or white in colour.
 
See if you are able to borrow a set of headphones or speakers that are the three ring type, most if not all Dell Latitude systems have a combination microphone/headphone jack which requires a 3 ring TRRS connector, the rings on the jack are conductors and being one ring/conductor short would explain the headphones and speakers not working.
 
Hmm, I have another Latitude that these connectors work in. I'll try to find a 3-ring connector and check that, though.
 
Found some Dell info on two and three ring connectors, apparently there are some Latitude notebooks that will work with two ring jack plugs, see info here
 
Hmm, interesting. Both laptops are E6440s (though their specs are actually slightly different), so I'm surprised the 2-ring jack would work in one but not the other. I had also thought that the 2-ring style was standard for 3.5 mm audio ports, so I'm surprised a laptop wouldn't support it (I've checked a couple of old headphones and speakers I have lying around, and haven't found a 3-ring jack yet).
 
Aiwendil said:
Both laptops are E6440s (though their specs are actually slightly different),
Click to expand...

You don`t mention how the specs between the two differ but if they both have combo ports the headphones and speakers should work, are both notebooks set up exactly the same, same drivers and audio settings etc.
 
Sorry, I've been unable to find a three-ring audio plug to test. But I suspect that it's a hardware problem with the jack, since my almost identical laptop does not require a three-ring plug.
 
Aiwendil said:
Both laptops are E6440s (though their specs are actually slightly different),
Click to expand...

phillpower2 said:
You don`t mention how the specs between the two differ but if they both have combo ports the headphones and speakers should work, are both notebooks set up exactly the same, same drivers and audio settings etc.
Click to expand...

No problem was just checking that you had received notification of my last reply, any chance that you can let us know the answer to the question above and if the two notebooks both have the exact type of jack ports.
 
As far as I can tell, they have the same drivers and all the audio settings are the same. The jack ports look identical. The only hardware differences I'm aware of between the two laptops are screen resolution and hard drive size.
 
Not sure what else to suggest tbh, any chance that you could ask a local tech store to test the port for you.
 
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