A Dell speaker bar lost audio output shortly after going out of warranty. Not thinking to check the headphone jack, I tore it apart, and of course it started working so I couldn’t trace the failure.

Then a couple days later, I lost audio again. This time I tried headphones and I had sound, and if I jiggled the headphone jack, I would get speaker audio for a bit. Then the speakers died again with only headphone audio. I suspect this new old stock part has tarnished contacts, that the insertion of the headphone does not wipe.

So what is needed is new headphone jacks, or jumper the speakers to be always on with headphones. For now I just plug in headphones.

The little headphone jack daughterboard has 5 wires going to it

• gnd
• left audio
• right audio
• 12V
• mute: this line is 9.6 or 5.5 volts, can’t just cut or short it.