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The Samsung Galaxy S24
DMcB24's profile

Tutor

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4 Messages

Saturday, January 31st, 2015 1:14 PM

Galaxy S4 no sound during phone calls

Hi,

I've owned my Galaxy S4 and used on the AT&T network for the past 1.5 years. Just 3 days ago, my phone just decided to not provide any sound whatsoever from the caller end or receiver end on both inbound and outbound phone calls. I've read several Web forums dated within the past year on the issue. I've tried turning off OK Google, running the phone on safe mode, using 3rd party Dialer apps, and nothing has come close to working.

I do not want to have to restore to factory settings, especially since this option has been far from a guarantee of working from what I've read online.

Are there any other options for me to consider? Has AT&T reached out to Samsung to find a solution? It's beyond reason how this issue has clearly been known to exist for so long and neither company has a clear explanation as to why this happens (I've read multiple suggested causes) and a full list of options a customer can take to resolve the matter.

This is driving me completely insane.

Accepted Solution

Official Solution

Professor

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3.1K Messages

9 years ago

I assume you powered off/on, if not do try that first.

 

Two things to try...

 

Turn off bluetooth. It may be connecting to some bt headset and that's where your sound is going.

 

If not that... try plugging in a wired headset. If you get audio via the wired headset then the phone might have a stuck headphone sensor switch... gently but repeatedly plug in/remove headphones to try and clear that.

 

 

Tutor

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4 Messages

9 years ago

This did not resolve the issue. I made sure bluetooth was turned off on my phone and restarted the device several times. I can connect my bluetooth headphones and successfully send/receive calls through the bluetooth device. If bluetooth is off, I cannot send/receive calls directly through my phone. 

 

Regarding a wired headset, I don't own one. I previously used wired headphones to workout, before I bought by bluetooth set, but I can't imagine the headphone sensor swtich is a correct answer because all other audio on the phone is working as it should. I can play songs, movies, etc. successfully through my phones speakers (which shouldn't be the case if the sensor switch was the problem). 

 

I appreciate the response, but this did not solve my problem. I'm a bit confused by this entry being labeled as "Solved". Shouldn't you confirm with the person reporting the issue first. Please let me know if there are any other options I can pursue. 

 

Today I downloaded Google Hangouts Dialer which will let me make phones calls from my phone by using wifi or AT&T data. The audio connects without any issue using the app, but isn't a preferred solution as it has multiple draw backs (confusing caller ID, cannot receive calls, etc.) I tried downloading other dialers that would not use data and send/receive calls directly from my phone, but these apps did not work. 

Contributor

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2 Messages

9 years ago

I was recently in the same situation, ended up odin flashing back to stock nb1, now I'm on 4.4.4, all is good.  I haven't let any apps update to this point.  Before flashing to stock I tried all the fixes, turn off google now, drive, different dialer, nothing...  One of the apps on my phone was causing  it, just need to find out which one.  I will be going through one by one to update and test, but for now I need this phone to work so I can't.  Let u know.

Tutor

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6 Messages

9 years ago

gdog1977, is your phone still working?  We are having the same issue and are reluctant to flash the rom, but will if it really does fix it.  Did you figure out which app was the problem?  Thanks!

Tutor

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4 Messages

9 years ago

Thanks for sharing your similar experience. I've literally tried everything that has come across on any type of google search result involving galaxy s4 and no sound during calls. This week I reset by phone to factory settings...and it did not solve the problem. I've found two work arounds to make and/or receive calls while experiencing this problem: 1) Google Hangout Dialer via wifi or data plan: I can only make calls. Cannot receive on this app. Sometimes the call will cut out/end if wifi or data plan connection is not strong; or 2) Bluetooth device. For some reason the s4 dialer will send/receive calls normally through a bluetooth connection. The only downside of this is that I have to look like a douchbag walking around and talking on a bluetooth headset whenever I need to make a call. I personally can't stand people that choose to use bluetooth for every call. Is it really that challenging to hold your phone?
 
I'm concluding also that it relates to 4.4.4. I'm holding off for the 5.0 Lollipop update (when is that going to be released for -I377?), and if that does not solve the problem, I'm throwing my Galaxy s4 in my fire pit and happily watching it burn. It's really irritating that the moderator of this site labeled the initial response to my post as a "solution". It's pretty clear to me that there is no solution for what I'm currently experiencing, AT&T and Samsung know this, and they do not care to invest the resources required to develop an appropriate solution. Why do that when it might motivate someone to just buy a new phone? 
 
Good luck. I hope maybe some solution online will work for you. I think hope is lost for me (outside of possibly 5.0). 

Professor

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3.1K Messages

9 years ago

Can you try one more thing for me?

 

Power down your phone, pull the battery, and let it sit for a while with the battery out - several min at least - then put it all togeather and fire it up.

 

If there is some oddball mode the hardware is in that might clear it. Probably not, but really that's about the last thing you could do short of re-flashing it (which you can't do easily)

New Member

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25.7K Messages

9 years ago

to get the hangouts app to recieve calls you have to go to google voice and have on gtalk forwarding on then you GV number will recieve calls through the app. I have something for you to try to see if it will work. would you be willing to reflash firmware manually? I would even be willing to help you with that to see if it would work?

Tutor

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6 Messages

9 years ago

It isn't the hangouts app, it's ANY sound during phone... everything else
worked perfectly.

ATT customer support was completely unable to assist. I invested several
hours of time to no purpose. Ironically, customer support also got
disconnected more than once.

The phone worked fine until ATT rolled out 4.4.4. Then everything else
worked, including music, microphone, camera, etc, and I could dial calls
and receive them. The only thing that went wrong was that I could not hear
anything in the call and nothing I said was audible to the person on the
other end of the call. This problem is comparatively rare but clearly not
extremely extremely rare, since I read in this and other forums there are
instances of this happening to Samsung Galaxies at various times for
several years back. This is not the first Samsung phone I'd had with
inexplicable problems-- the first one I ever had randomly and unaccountably
would shut down requiring reboots, and of course no one could figure out
why, but others were also afflicted. Not most customers obviously because
they kept selling more and more phones.

My guess is-- Samsung buys its stuff from any and every third and fourth
world entrepeneurial hellhole that has a factory, and even theoretically
identical components will vary, for instance microcode versions that have
bugs which may not rear their ugly heads until some other OS or application
update comes along... but this is a guess.

It happened I had another Galaxy 4 in a drawer due to previous
carelessness-- I had, just before a trip, mislaid my phone, and being up
against a travel deadline, went out and bought a new one. Of course, just
as I knew I would, after the trip ended and I returned home I found my old
phone immediately... and put it aside, because you can never tell. And
then this problem happened -- so I switched simms and was back up.

However-- ATT now started to want to push the 4.4.4 update out to this
older phone. I have no confidence that there would be no problem again.
And I was sick of Samsung anyway; the very first Galaxy I ever had randomly
shut down and rebooted (another documented issue that happened inexplicably
to some and not many) and I sent it back. I had also been thinking of
getting a phone with more memory (and larger screen) and I always hated the
bloatware plague of ATT and Samsung together.

So I decided to bite the bullet and switch to an Apple iphone 6 plus.
Apple is an evil empire, but at least this phone has 128 GB and only
Apple-approved bloatware. Seems one is always at the mercy of one evil
empire or the other, there is no help for it.

We recently bought an LG washing machine. Our 28 year old Maytag had just
died. Read bad things about the Samsungs. Actually read bad things about
all the brands, even Maytag.

Seems when I was a kid (in the 1960's) we never had problems with computers
or cell phones! Hmmm, wonder why... we live now in a world where a
corporation can reach out and break your functioning piece of hardware and
still charge you fees for the damage. Like paying protection to gangsters
but instead of protection they beat you up anyway, just because they can
and you can't do anything about it.



New Member

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25.7K Messages

9 years ago

I know it isn't the hangouts app but GV by default is a forwarding service. To get hangouts to be it's own phone number with in comming and out going calls from the GV number make sure it is only forwarded to gtalk. With having the 4.4.4 update you can go back to nb1 from nj4 and that is what I was proposing

Tutor

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4 Messages

9 years ago

Hi - Thanks for your response. The instructions for receiving calls with
hangouts will be helpful. I appreciate the offer to help reflash the
firmware manually, but I'm too exhausted from this problem at this point. I
tried shutting down the phone and letting sit without a battery for awhile,
but of course that didn't work. I've just lost motivation to care anymore.
I'm content with using my bluetooth headset for calls for the time being,
and hoping that a system upgrade will resolve, and if not, I'll get another
phone from another provider. Thanks again.

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