Reset to 1969?

[taylorpc]

About 20 minutes ago I was surfing the net, and my computer blinked off. Strange. I knew the battery was close to toast, so I brought it downstairs to plug in. I pressed power, logged in, and OS X booted up. However, I got a strange error message saying that my "computer's internal clock was set to a date before March 24, 2001... some applications may act erratically". Nothing would open, and everything usually in the upper right hand corner was missing - time, battery, etc... and I couldn't get on the internet at all. So I rebooted again, opened up system preferences and my computer was set to 12-31-1969. I set the current date, and now everything seems to be fine. What the HECK happened?

[WildCowboy]

Sounds like your backup battery that stores things like date and time is dead. What computer is this?

This happens with my old iBook 500 MHz if I let the battery completely drain. I get that notice when I initially start it back up, but it quickly syncs with the time server and figures out the correct date and time.

[taylorpc]

This is an ibook G4... yeah, that makes sense. My battery won't hold a charge for longer than 30 minutes or so. Wierd, because it will give me the low battery warning at like 40 or 50% power. Appreciate the response!

[PYR0M310N]

that happened with my ibook when i was in the process of getting a non-exploding battery! but it would let me connect to the internet, so that is strange

[wot58"slip]

I have also had this problem with my iBook G4, but slightly different circumstances...

The first time was just after I bought the computer (used). When I first started it up, I couldn't access the hard drive at all. After some time, the error message cited above popped up for no apparent reason, but as soon as I reset the clock, everything worked.

That was about 8 months ago, and it hasn't happened again until about two days ago. Two out of the last four days, the clock has been reset to 1969 when I open the iBook up first thing in the morning. The funny thing is that the computer was plugged in over these nights, and my battery generally holds a charge for around two hours.

Any ideas?

[indefatigable]

This happened to my powerbook (3 years old now) before I got a non-exploding battery—which I was way too lazy in getting. I would just connect to the internet, and the time/date fixed itself. Or, if I was in a place with no internet, you can set it yourself, I believe...

[indefatigable]

Oops, thread is way old, sorry!

[wot58"slip]

This thread started way old, but the issue is still out there...

[Sun Baked]

This thread started way old, but the issue is still out there...

Wasn't quite a thread from 12-31-1969, but close to it if you use the computer years to human years conversion. :p