Corrupt Sound Preferences

[Rhisiart]

1. I cannot adjust my sound volume on my Mac Mini. 2. Whenever I click on the Sound panel in System Preferences, System Preferences fails to respond and I have to force quit it.

Any ideas re: solutions please?

Update: Now System Preferences unresponsive for all panels.

 

[Satcomer]

Sounds like a hard drive might be failing. See if you can test that.

 

[DeltaMac]

You're running Lion, correct? It's simple to reboot to your recovery system, and run Disk Utility to test your hard drive.

What else have you tried?:
restart in Safe Boot mode, and try your various system prefs.
boot to another user account, and see if your prefs work OK. Make a new, fresh user just for this purpose.

Remove your existing prefs (those with sound somewhere in the name), then log out, and log back in to your user. Try your prefs.
Remove the existing prefs that control your system preferences, such as com.apple.systemprefences.plist - com.apple.systemuiserver.plist - com.apple.bezelservices.plist - maybe some others that might affect your situation.
If you look in your user folder/library, then in the caches folder, you'll see several that relate directly to your system preferences. Most anything in that Caches folder can be deleted, and may help in your quest.

 

[Rhisiart]

You're running Lion, correct?

Yes

It's simple to reboot to your recovery system, and run Disk Utility to test your hard drive.

It passed with flying colours.

Boot to another user account, and see if your prefs work OK.

No, they don't work using another User account.

Restart in Safe Boot mode, and try your various system prefs.

Everything works perfectly in Safe Mode.

Remove your existing prefs (those with sound somewhere in the name), then log out, and log back in to your user. Try your prefs.

No difference.

Remove the existing prefs that control your system preferences, such as com.apple.systemprefences.plist - com.apple.systemuiserver.plist - com.apple.bezelservices.plist - maybe some others that might affect your situation.
If you look in your user folder/library, then in the caches folder, you'll see several that relate directly to your system preferences. Most anything in that Caches folder can be deleted, and may help in your quest.

No difference.

 

[DeltaMac]

...
No, they don't work using another User account.

Everything works perfectly in Safe Mode.
...

There's some other files you can delete
/Library/Caches folder: com.apple.components2.LocalCache.AudioComponents

Then, /Library/Preferences folder:
com.apple.BezelServices.xxx
(probably two files there... )
there will be a "Audio" folder in that preferences folder, too. You could just drag that folder to the trash, too.

Some of those items will probably ask you to authenticate, so do that so you can trash those files/folders.
RESTART your Mac, as you probably can't empty the trash until you restart. Those files get rebuilt during a restart, too.

 

[Rhisiart]

I fixed the problem eventually by doing a complete clean install. Took forever to do but luckily everything was backed up.

Many thanks.