I have a macbook air late 2008 which is fully loaded with the 1.86ghz processor and 128gb ssd. It was working fine with no signs of fault until a day ago. I restarted it and realized the trackpad wasn't working. I clicked it a couple times and tried to move it and apply pressure to it, but it was completely dead. I pressed the power button and the message came up, but when I hit enter to shut down, I realized the whole keyboard didn't work. Even plugging in a usb mouse or keyboard wouldn't work. If I plug in a flash drive, the light comes on for a second and then turns off, even when fully booted. Also I noticed the bluetooth icon has a squiggle through it, which means that's probably not working. The keyboard backlight comes on, so it's getting power, but even if I hit keys, it eventually turns off like it's idling. Judging by the icons on the statusbar, it looks like wifi and sound are working normally.
I searched online, and did the smc reset. That worked, as I could see the charging like turn off then to green, then red again. So I know the keyboard can register keys. I think there is something corrupt in the boot process where it is not loading the usb driver correctly. I tried doing a pram reset, but it didn't respond to the keys at all. I even tried the other command and option keys. If I hold the power button on startup, the light stays on and flashes after about 10 seconds and then restarts. I'm not sure what that does but I did it a few times. I'm not sure how the mac bootloader works, so I have no clue of any little tricks I can do to find any hidden menus. That would be helpful if you could pass those on. I have the capability of making ubuntu or mac usb startup drives, so if you know of any guides where I could restore the bootloader or something, let me know.
I just don't think this is a hardware / logic board issue becuase I can do the smc reset just fine. It takes longer than normal on the first grey screen on startup, so I think it just doesn't want to load that usb driver and get everything to work right when it turns on.
I searched online, and did the smc reset. That worked, as I could see the charging like turn off then to green, then red again. So I know the keyboard can register keys. I think there is something corrupt in the boot process where it is not loading the usb driver correctly. I tried doing a pram reset, but it didn't respond to the keys at all. I even tried the other command and option keys. If I hold the power button on startup, the light stays on and flashes after about 10 seconds and then restarts. I'm not sure what that does but I did it a few times. I'm not sure how the mac bootloader works, so I have no clue of any little tricks I can do to find any hidden menus. That would be helpful if you could pass those on. I have the capability of making ubuntu or mac usb startup drives, so if you know of any guides where I could restore the bootloader or something, let me know.
I just don't think this is a hardware / logic board issue becuase I can do the smc reset just fine. It takes longer than normal on the first grey screen on startup, so I think it just doesn't want to load that usb driver and get everything to work right when it turns on.