Computer randomly shutting down

[littlestkitten]

I have a ibook G4 that's been randomly shutting down. It started doing this maybe about a month ago but it's started getting really bad lately. At first it would shut down if I unplugged the adapter. Not every time I unplugged it, but probably about 50% of the time. When I press the battery button all of the green lights would light up. About half of the time it will start up again if I just hit the power button but the half of the time I have to reset the pRAM. Lately this same thing has been happening except when the computer is still plugged in. And when in say shutting down I mean essentially instantaneously. One second it's on and then the screen goes black and it makes that turning off noise. Not a chime, but like all the fans and hardware are coming to a stop.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

 

[spinnerlys]

The battery is most likely completely depleted of its original charge. You can use System Profiler to see the current cycles and battery health (capacity).

from http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1519

My iBook also has a loose connection to the power adapter, meaning that the current does only flow (which you can see by the green/orange light at the power plug connected to the iBook) when the cable is angled at certain angles...


Or it could be, that your logic board is dying or some other connection is loose.

Have a look at the battery and power adapter and see if that is the problem, and report back.

 

[littlestkitten]

Here's the information from the system profiler. If it was the battery, wouldn't it have to be mostly uncharged for it to turn off? I know that my battery doesn't hold as much charge as it used to, but when my computer doesn't shut down when I unplug it I do have about a half an hour before I have to plug it in again. I do think that the actual charger sits a little loose, I've been wondering if that's why it's been turning off when the adapter appears plugged in.

System Power Settings:

AC Power:
System Sleep Timer (Minutes): 0
Disk Sleep Timer (Minutes): 10
Display Sleep Timer (Minutes): 20
Dynamic Power Step: No
Reduce Processor Speed: No
Automatic Restart On Power Loss: No
Wake On AC Change: No
Wake On Clamshell Open: Yes
Wake On LAN: Yes
Wake On Modem Ring: Yes
Display Sleep Uses Dim: Yes
Battery Power:
System Sleep Timer (Minutes): 5
Disk Sleep Timer (Minutes): 10
Display Sleep Timer (Minutes): 1
Dynamic Power Step: No
Reduce Processor Speed: Yes
Automatic Restart On Power Loss: No
Wake On AC Change: No
Wake On Clamshell Open: Yes
Wake On Modem Ring: No
Display Sleep Uses Dim: Yes
Reduce Brightness: Yes

Battery Information:

Battery Installed: Yes
First low level warning: No
Full Charge Capacity (mAh): 1124
Remaining Capacity (mAh): 1089
Amperage (mA): 0
Voltage (mV): 16564
Cycle Count: 267

AC Charger Information:

AC Charger (Watts): 0
Connected: Yes
Charging: No

Hardware Configuration:

Clamshell Closed: No
UPS Installed: No