Big problem with my 12" PB.....

[sethypoo]

Well, today I brought my 12" PowerBook (rev. A), as I always do, to school to work on homework and to surf the next wirelessly. This morning I used it in the library and it was working just fine. I did what I needed to do on it, then closed the lid and put it in its case, then into my back pack. I took it back out about an hour later, opened it up, and nothing happened. Did a forced restart, and the PB powered up fine, except there is NO video.

I hear the startup sound, but nothing comes on screen. The screen doesn't power up at all. I hear the hard drive going, but nothing is on screen!

Needless to say, HELP!

 

[abhishekit]

although i dont really know how to solve your problem, you can check one thing..
boot while pressing cmd+opt+o+f, you will enter open firmware. you will get a welcome message and other stuff, and finally get a prompt.
write 'dev screen' without '. press enter. then (in next line ) write '.properties' press enter.
you should see a bunch of stuff, as name. properties, other things

screen is the alias of the primary display which BootX uses. so if you dont get any dev name , it means your monitor is not being detected.

as per remedy, i am sorry, i cant tell much..may be do the hardware test from the cd.
hope it helps

edit: at firmware you can continue booting by writing 'mac-boot' or shut down by writing 'shut-down' and pressing enter

 

[joker2]

abhishekit: sounds like what sethypoo is saying is that he wouldn't see that either... My thought (though not very helpful) is to take it to an Apple shop. The most it can be is what, a month out of warranty?

 

[Gee]

You have made sure the brightness is not turned all the way down (F1), yes?

 

[rfenik]

does an external vga work? how about hooking it up to your tv? that happened to me once, but i forced a restart and it worked fine after that.

-ko

 

[sethypoo]

abhishekit- thanks for your advice! I'll keep that for later.

I have already taken it to an Apple reselller for repair work. They hope to have it fixed by tomorrow afternoon.

Gee- yes, I checked to brightness thing already .

Thanks for all your help, I'll let you all know what's up once I know.

 

[sethypoo]

I just got a call from the repair shop. They were unable to revive the computer.

The guy said there might be problems with the logic board. Luckily, I purchased the laptop last July, so I still (I think) have that one year warranty. Do I?

Also, if the logic board really is shot, will I be able to salvage any of my data? As I said in my first post on this thread, the hard drive is spinning, so could I attach a Ethernet cable between my 12" PB and an iMac and access any of my data?

 

[wordmunger]

I have had these exact symptoms on my TiBook before. It turned out the battery wasn't properly seated in the computer. All I had to do was to pull out the battery and pop it back in, then it worked fine. Hope this is all it is!

 

[joker2]

I doubt the ethernet cable would work (but you could try it)... a better bet would be firewire target disk mode... though since they possibly already have it taken apart at the repair shop, you could get them to possibly transfer the contents to another drive that you bring in or bring in the imac.

You registered when you bought your mac in July, I would assume, so it should easily be under warranty, and you didn't have to pay the $49 for apple phone tech support as you brought it into an authorized dealer, so they should be able to do the warranty gymnastics.

 

[sethypoo]

Originally posted by wordmunger
I have had these exact symptoms on my TiBook before. It turned out the battery wasn't properly seated in the computer. All I had to do was to pull out the battery and pop it back in, then it worked fine. Hope this is all it is!

I actually tried that, no luck though.

Shadow95- I remember a few months ago I tried to get help from Apple when my FileVault ate my system, and they wouldn't do anything unless I paid $49.00.

I don't remember "registering", I was told by an Apple representative that my warrantee started when I bought the computer.

 

[superbovine]

maybe you got a gremlin

 

[joker2]

FileVault ate my system

Ah, but that's a software problem In theory, the authorized repair center has already diagnosed the problem and can help you get the new logic board under warranty.

I don't remember "registering", I was told by an Apple representative that my warrantee started when I bought the computer.

That first set of screens that you encounter when you first got your powerbook took your name, address, etc. and had a pause while it transmitted to Apple, assuming you were hooked up to something Internet-connected. Anyhow, you've already had contact with AppleCare, so they have your information that way too.

 

[sethypoo]

Ok, that makes more sense. The repair shop I took it to can't do warrantee repairs. They told me to contact Apple with the problem, so should I just tell Apple that I already took it into and authorized repair shop and that they couldn't fix it?

 

[mikeyredk]

sethypoo if they couldn't fix it they should have sent it to apple unless they aren't liceensed in that case call apple and they will send you a box

 

[thegivenone]

AIRPORT CARD!!!!!!

have seen similar problems on a 17" Rev. B......
Try make sure the APX card is sitting properly under the battery-this sometimes causes major problems if it isn't sitting properly.
If it still doesn't work, try removing the entire card and booting up.