MacBook keeps frying batteries-getting expensive

[wordyeti]

About a month ago, the battery in my 3-year-old MacBook Pro 13" suddenly decided to go toes-up. And by "suddenly," I mean when the magsafe is detached, the MBP goes completely dead as a doornail.

It's out of warranty now, so I sucked it up and bought a new battery. Installed it no prob. Hooked it up to the magsafe, waited for it to charge as per the instructions, booted it up - and the battery worked great ...

For a few days. And then the little "x" appeared in the battery icon up in the upper-right corner, and once again, I have a MBP that can only work when plugged in to the wall. Not optimal.

Any suggestions for what i should look at? Previous experience with the so-called "Geniuses" have taught me that going to an Apple store and actually expecting any real help is proof of utter naivete. (Long saga about video cards in my MacPro and the kernel panic in my iPad omitted for reasons of length and my blood pressure.) So - any suggestions as to what I should focus on? Is it perhaps the charger (and how would I know)? Or is it the motherboard? Or some setting buried in a sub-menu that needs to be tweaked before I shell out another couple hunnert on yet another battery that gets fried...

 

[GGJstudios]

Did you reset the SMC? Other than that, I'd have Apple look at it, despite your reservations.

 

[Naimfan]

Sorry to say that it sounds like a hardware problem--like the contacts are touching intermittently or you have a short in the battery/charging circuit. I'd take the bottom off, remove the battery, and see if you see any signs of shorting (minute traces of black or any other discoloration on the board). If so, take it in--the only fix is to replace whatever board you see that on.

If you take it to Apple, they MAY repair any such problem, but that's not likely, and they are likely to say it is a logic board problem, which is obscenely expensive. Still, that's probably your best bet, at least to get it diagnosed.

Hope that helps, and good luck.

 

[GuitarG20]

I would try resetting the SMC. Other than that, sounds like a hardware problem - sorry. :/