I just purchased a brand new 1.5 GHz 15 inch PowerBook G4 a few weeks ago. LOVE IT. Several orders of magnitude better than my previous machine (a clamshell 466 MHz DV iBook).
But three times now, I've noticed that the computer was not receiving power from the external power supply (light around power port is out, menu bar indicates running on battery power). I know that the supply needs to be plugged tightly into the computer or it'll lose the connection (figured that out pretty quickly), but that isn't the problem. Each time, the connector was firmly in place. Each time, I tried pulling that plug and reseating it, but to no avail. The solution everytime was to reset the surge protector the computer was plugged into by switching THAT off and on, and the computer immediately switched over to external power. This has happened on two different strips, both of which I know are good.
I'm at a loss to understand this behavior. I did notice that two of three times, I'd been using a dremel tool plugged into the same protector/power strip shortly before noticing that the computer wasn't getting power. The other time, I don't believe there was anything unusual plugged in, but I don't remember.
Is this normal? I don't want to call Apple over this just yet, but thought I'd toss it out here.
One possible explanation that I thought of was that the power supply might have an internal circuit breaker to protect itself (and the laptop!) from any spikes, and that the dremel tool might have produced enough of a surge to trip it, except that 1) the actual surge protector didn't blink 2) I tried to make it happen again by revving up the dremel tool and nothing happened and 3) running an upright vacuum cleaner on the same power strip didn't trigger it.
Maybe I just have a bad power supply? Any thoughts? Thanks in advance.
But three times now, I've noticed that the computer was not receiving power from the external power supply (light around power port is out, menu bar indicates running on battery power). I know that the supply needs to be plugged tightly into the computer or it'll lose the connection (figured that out pretty quickly), but that isn't the problem. Each time, the connector was firmly in place. Each time, I tried pulling that plug and reseating it, but to no avail. The solution everytime was to reset the surge protector the computer was plugged into by switching THAT off and on, and the computer immediately switched over to external power. This has happened on two different strips, both of which I know are good.
I'm at a loss to understand this behavior. I did notice that two of three times, I'd been using a dremel tool plugged into the same protector/power strip shortly before noticing that the computer wasn't getting power. The other time, I don't believe there was anything unusual plugged in, but I don't remember.
Is this normal? I don't want to call Apple over this just yet, but thought I'd toss it out here.
One possible explanation that I thought of was that the power supply might have an internal circuit breaker to protect itself (and the laptop!) from any spikes, and that the dremel tool might have produced enough of a surge to trip it, except that 1) the actual surge protector didn't blink 2) I tried to make it happen again by revving up the dremel tool and nothing happened and 3) running an upright vacuum cleaner on the same power strip didn't trigger it.
Maybe I just have a bad power supply? Any thoughts? Thanks in advance.