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Did my MBA just die?

W

Wickintime

macrumors member
Original poster
Feb 27, 2018
88
27
Melbourne, Australia
I have a 2011 MBA 13" in great condition and very low usage. I recently replaced the cracked screen and SSD and upgraded it to run Mojave.

I was using it today as I wanted to try my old i-sight camera with it. The camera was connected to a powered firewire hub and then I used a firewire-usb adaptor. As I connected the usb to the connector on the RH side the screen went blank. I looked at the power connector and the green indicator light had gone out and no orange light either. Now it will not power-up and there are no lights on the charger.

Any suggestions on what I can try next or is it dead?
 
I had the battery disconnected overnight and no change - it is just dead. I've now had it plugged into the charger for several hours, but no lights on the connector and still no response.

Any more ideas anyone?
 
This probably won't work, but try booting holding the Option key. If you hear the bootup chime, then it could be an SSD problem
 
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Wickintime said:
I had the battery disconnected overnight and no change - it is just dead. I've now had it plugged into the charger for several hours, but no lights on the connector and still no response.

Any more ideas anyone?
Click to expand...

Were these cables and connectors from a reputed, reliable source? It is possible that a surge caused a fried circuit inside and caused this. If you must, then take the computer to an Apple Store or any place that will open and see what the issue could be and hope that it would be fixed.
 
Wickintime said:
I had the battery disconnected overnight and no change - it is just dead. I've now had it plugged into the charger for several hours, but no lights on the connector and still no response.

Any more ideas anyone?
Click to expand...
Try another charger to see if it is the actual charger?
 
I once plugged an external CD drive into my Macbook via USB, then connected the transformer to the CD drive. Unfortunately, I used a transformer with the wrong polarity. As well as an electrical burning smell from the CD drive itself, my Macbook immediately shut down. This sounds similar to what's happened to you but with a slightly different cause.

Unfortunately I do believe your Macbook Air has been damaged. For somebody who knows what they're doing, it probably isn't too difficult to repair as there are several fuses on the logic board to protect against USB over-current. It's likely one or more of those fuses could be replaced but it's not a trivial job.
 
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Thanks Saturnine, I think you may be spot on here. It happened just as I pushed the USB connector in. I'll take it to my local tech in the next couple of days and go from there. It may well be beyond economic repair, but there is only one way to find out...!
 
Wickintime said:
Thanks Saturnine, I think you may be spot on here. It happened just as I pushed the USB connector in. I'll take it to my local tech in the next couple of days and go from there. It may well be beyond economic repair, but there is only one way to find out...!
Click to expand...
Unfortunately a new lockdown prevents me from visiting my local tech.

In the meantime, can anyone help me locate the fuses which might be affected on the logic board or know of where I can find this information?

Thanks
 
I have a bad news for you: there's no such thing as a "firewire to usb adapter".
Those are special plugs for special uses, NOT for your generic firewire and usb stuff. I've seen them sold in cheap stores and fairs, and I really wonder why. Even the sellers seem unaware.
And yes, I've seen people burning their gear with those, and I had to carry the bad news.
You probably killed your MBA.
Sorry.
 
biffuz said:
I have a bad news for you: there's no such thing as a "firewire to usb adapter".
Those are special plugs for special uses, NOT for your generic firewire and usb stuff. I've seen them sold in cheap stores and fairs, and I really wonder why. Even the sellers seem unaware.
And yes, I've seen people burning their gear with those, and I had to carry the bad news.
You probably killed your MBA.
Sorry.
Click to expand...
Thanks biffuz, you've just made my day...............Yikes!
 
Thanks everyone for your advice. I had the board checked and it was pronounced 'dead'.

Some time ago I replaced the SSD as the original was on its last legs. It then ran faultlessly on Mojave until I 'fried' the board.

However, I managed to source a replacement board and that was duly fitted. It took a long long time to boot into Mojave but it eventually made it. I booted into safe mode successfully but then the screen went black and it rebooted into Mojave all by itself, even slower than before. I had previously loaded a patcher to enable Mojave, but I seem to recall that a firmware update from HS had been required to enable it to work properly. Perhaps that upgrade was missing on the replacement board? Then it stopped booting fully with the thermometer bar running all the way to the end but not quite getting there - only a whisker short.

I refitted the original SSD to check the board out and that booted straight to HS at normal speed, so confident the main board was ok, I went back to the new SSD.

Now, it will not complete any boot cycle. If I use a 'control' boot then it will see my Catalina boot stick and that will run as far as ...'less than one second remaining' and there it sits for hours!

Apologies for the length of this post but I'm fresh out of ideas now and would welcome any suggestions!

Thanks.
 
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