Unreliable sound - speaker symbol greyed out and red light in 3.5mm jack

Had my MacBook for 3 years with no problems. But over the past few months, the sound has been very unreliable. It always works when external speakers are plugged in, but when using the internal speakers it's very temperamental. It will just suddenly grey out the speaker symbol on the menu bar at the top, and a red light is visible in the 3.5mm jack socket.
Any ideas???

Your Mac believes that a digital audio cable is plugged in. You can use a toothpick or unbent paper clip to toggle the DA switch off. It's located along the side of the port, not at the back whence the light emanates.

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I have a MacBook Pro 9.2 (i7 3rd gen, HD4000, 750GB, 8GB) and i install Windows 8 Pro 64 bit. I have a issue with my headphone jack only when i use BootCamp i have the latest driver for it (download from bootcamp application OSX). I see that inside of the headphone jack there is a red light i think that it is the optical out of it. I try to reinstall the driver no succes. Now i need help to fix it

The red light means you have jammed the digital audio jack by inserting an analog plug too far. It is not a BootCamp issie--can happen to people without BootCamp. Here is the reason for the problem I posted in another thread:
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Bottom line is you do NOT want to insert any random plug "to the hilt" until you know it is dimensioned to fit a digital port.
My MacBook Pro has the same jack. I have a pair of decent-quality, name-brand headphones and their plug is not to spec. This picture shows their plug in the port at a position that delivers proper sound and does not let the plug fall out:
Note that the shoulder is about 1/16-inch from contacting the computer case. It is secure in this position.
Every plug is different. I have a pair of El Cheapo external speakers I picked up for US$2 at a yard sale and their plug fits perfectly on my Macs with a digital audio port. Go figure!

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sideeque wrote:
I have the same problem. What did you do last time?
What should I do now? Its around 40 miles away the apple store? Would they pay my taxi fare to go and return?
How can we trust this apple product?
You are still under warranty. Call Apple Care.

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When you go to System Preferences > Sound what does it say for Output? Have you had headphones plugged in? Sometimes the headphone jack gets stuck thinking it has something plugged in when there isn't anaything there. SMC also has something to do with Sound:
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http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3964
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I wonder if there is a broken .plist file that may be fixed ...?

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Hi Holliecollie93,
It sounds very frustrating that you are unable to use wifi with your iPhone. I do have an article that I would like you to use in order to troubleshoot this, though it sounds as if you have already done some of the steps provided -
iOS: Wi-Fi settings grayed out or dim
http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1559
Specifically -
Resolution
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Restart your iOS device.
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Hello Den53,
Thanks for using Apple Support Communities.
For more information on this, take a look at:
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http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1430?viewlocale=en_US
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Unreliable sound - speaker symbol greyed out and red light in 3.5mm jack

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