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Strange: The MacBook Is Back

October 17th, 2009

I had given up the MacBook for dead and was about to remove its hard drive and stick it in an enclosure when just by chance, I hit the power button. And lo and behold it turned on. Back from the afterlife.

Am really at a loss to understand what happened here. The MacBook was turned off and left alone for a few days. Now it’s working again. Maybe there’s some part that had to cool down or some Apple fairies magically fixed something. The latter is odd since prayer was not involved.

Anyhow, going without for a few days opened my eyes. A laptop is rather a luxury in my case; I realized I didn’t miss it that much. I just used the Mac Mini more, and the iPhone. Email, light web surfing, games, and Twitter are all good enough and sometimes better (more portable, certainly) on the iPhone. So a MacBook feels like a “nice to have” but not a necessity anymore.

Am also expecting the MacBook to fail at any moment. I’ve already copied stuff off of it, and might do a complete reinstall of Snow Leopard just for kicks.

This also changes plans regarding what new Mac to purchase. There is some rumbling that Apple will announce new iMacs, Mac Minis, and MacBooks before October is out. And this coming week would be great timing, to draw some attention away from the launch of Windows 7.

Since this MacBook is back and I’m questioning the need for a new one, I’ll likely continue with my plan of getting a new Mac Mini and delegating the present one to the entertainment system.

And if anybody has some theories regarding the magical MacBook resurrection I’m all ears.

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  • Macbooks are great I use them mainly for music and design application and they work just as good as a the desktop.
  • DaveD
    I commented on a previous post that my work laptop (Dell) was replaced after 4.5 years with a motherboard failure.

    It all started when I came in on a Monday morning and mentioned to our client support that I had troubles powering it up. I thought is was the on/off switch. They were concerned it was the motherboard. They checked it out and told me that since I was about 3 months aways from the 5 year mark they were simply going to replace it.

    That was Decmber 2008. I still have the old laptop. It took me a few days over the holidays to transfer various apps and files to my new PC. In May I needed to use an older version of Visual Studio that I refuse to put on my new laptop. Finally, in July I "multi-tasked" on a project from home.

    Here's the thing though - last weekend I tried to power it up and it wouldn't.

    This is just my personal experience, and it was with a Dell running Windows XP, so YMMV.
  • Mike
    How did this happen, and I didn't notice? I'm a certified tech at a third party shop - email me if you see any weirdness; I'll do my best to help (or just give me a nudge when you write about it again).

    My first thought is that the machine might have sustained accidental damage - either a drop, or a liquid spill. Pretty sure you'd mention that, though. Machines sometimes work for a while, and even stop working for a short time, when they're dropped or have a slight bit of liquid spilled.

    Did the machine get any power when you pressed the power button? Did you hear any fan activity, or see the LED on the front light up?

    Also, try resetting the SMC next time the machine won't power on. Unplug the machine, take out the battery, and hold down the power button for 5 seconds. Put back in the battery, plug in the power cable, and press the power button.

    If that doesn't work, remove the battery and see if the machine will turn on. Also, make sure the RAM is firmly seated - remove both chips and reinstall them. Be sure to press them in all the way - you'll probably need to put a few fingers on the top of the machine to make sure they're really in.

    Uh, what else, what else. If the machine does get power, but won't boot, I'd suspect the hard drive, first. Remove the hard drive, hold the Option key when booting, and see if you can boot from the CDs/DVDs that the machine originally came with (or another machine booted in FireWire Target Disk Mode).

    I can't stress enough that AppleCare is worthwhile. For many people, the parts and labor cover the cost alone. If you don't remember if you're still covered, you can check at apple.com/support if you've got your MacBook's serial number handy.

    But yeah, I see this kind of stuff all the time - give me a shout if I can help at all.
  • Hey Mike thanks for the info. Will definitely contact you if there are future Mac problems. Anyhow I did take it to the Apple Store and the genius dude there did some of these steps. The Mac was totally dead and the battery wouldn't take a charge when plugged in (light never turned amber even though the battery was partially drained and working).

    But now the MacBook is back and I have no idea why. Been using it for over a week with no problems.
  • Mike
    Cool, glad it's working now!

    Yeah, that stuff is pretty standard procedure. First step is to check for power, then to check if the machine will boot. If it won't get power, the problem is generally more dire (but still, could be something simple and inexpensive - you don't know until you start swapping out parts).

    Given that the AC adapter light didn't turn on, I'm starting to suspect the DC-in board (maybe the battery connector, but not terribly likely). Neither are expensive at all, and you'd probably regret replacing the machine over one of those.

    Good for them to set expectations that it could be a logic board, though - if it's not one of those minor parts, it'll probably be a logic board.
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