Integrated microphone failures

All Macs have a microphone built into one of their sides to make a basic audio recording. With this you can also give instructions to the voice assistant or make video calls without having to resort to other types of external microphones. This is an internal component of Macs and can end up breaking just like any other. There are several solutions that can be proposed to finish fixing it.

Check the audio inputs

The first thing to do is check if the Mac itself detects the internal microphone that is failing and does not pick up any type of ambient sound. To carry out this type of query you simply have to follow the following steps:

• Access System Preferences.
• Enter the ‘Sound’ section.
• In the upper tabs choose the option ‘Entry’.

If the microphone is properly connected to the computer board, it will be recognized on this screen as an ‘internal microphone’. In this way you ensure that a priori it must work correctly, although in practice it appears specified does not mean that it ends up recognizing the sounds. You must make sure that the ‘input volume’ bar is not to the far left as this will mean that the gain is zero and therefore it will not detect any type of sound.

At the bottom of this gain bar, you will see the input level that initially if there are no sounds will appear completely gray. If you start to speak and the microphone works correctly it will move with dark gray tones. In this case, the microphone is perfectly detected and picks up the ambient sound. If a specific application gives you errors, try trying a different one to see if it is not a problem with the hardware itself. You should also check that this application has the necessary privacy permissions to access the microphone and make this collection.

Perform an operating system format

In some cases, the operating system itself may be responsible for the microphone not detecting any type of sound. It would not be the first time that a major update ends up rendering a part of the hardware totally useless despite being reflected in the system preferences. In these cases you can resort to performing a complete reinstallation of the operating system. This obviously has some problems as a lot of your data will be lost if you don’t do any backup. You must bear in mind that in many cases the fact of making backup copies can end up causing this failure to be exported.

When performing a clean reinstallation in most cases, this type of problem will be solved in a satisfactory way in the event that it was a process that was causing the microphone not to detect any type of sound. It is also possible to perform a SMC reset by simultaneously pressing the Control + Option + Shift keys plus the power button, when the computer is off.

Go to an Apple Store

If none of this works, you should go to an Apple Store or an authorized technical service in order to carry out a thorough diagnosis of the microphone and if it records the audio correctly. In the event that it does not work, it is possible that they can repair it for free as long as the two-year warranty is still in force. Obviously, this will occur whenever the failure is due to a factory problem with this component and not due to misuse of the device.

Otherwise, if it is not within the warranty, Apple itself can repair it as long as you pay for the repair out of pocket, even if it is not a problem that you have caused.

Problems with USB or Bluetooth microphones

It is a reality that the sound quality offered by the internal microphone of any Mac is not very good. When you want to record a podcast or participate in a video conference, it is quite a problem that you have to connect a USB or Bluetooth microphone to have a higher quality. These can obviously also fail, but not because of the microphone itself but because of the Mac.

Check the ports of the Mac and the peripheral

The first thing you should do if you connect the microphone and it does not work is to resort to testing all the ports that the Mac has since it may be that one of them is giving problems or is simply blocked by some thread. Another obvious thing to take into account is to try other USB microphones since it may be a fault that is foreign to the computer itself and is uniquely related to the accessory you have connected.

If none of this works, check that the ports work for you by connecting any other accessory that is not an audio input. In this way you can rule out that it is an error in the ports themselves that do not supply any type of power. In these cases in which no port responds to any accessory, you should call on the technical service to carry out a check and, where appropriate, a repair.

Check your Mac’s Bluetooth settings

In the event that the problem is in a Bluetooth headset that does not have a receiver connected to the ports, you should check the configuration of the Mac itself. We recommend that you first turn off and on the computer’s bluetooth connectivity to force it to search for them again. In the event that they do not work correctly for you, you will still have to restore the headphones (if possible) and pair them again. This way you will make the Mac forget them completely and force the configuration as if they were brand new.

Never have the profit to zero

As we have previously commented, it is important never to have the gain at the sound input at zero. If this is the case, it is logical that the microphone, even if it is detected by the system and the computer, does not detect any type of sound. This is checked exactly as we have said before in System Preferences> Sound> Input and when clicking on the specific accessory check that the ‘audio input volume’ bar is on the right.