MacBook starts intermittently after spilled water:

[haliotis888]

Black 2.4 GHz MacBook A1181 recently suffered water damage on its left side from a leaking water bottle in my son's backpack. After COMPLETE drying, it now starts intermittently - perfect or fails-to-start. When it fails-to-start, I can hear the fan "whirring" and the continuous clicking of the HDD head "parking." Everyone seems to agree that the Logic Board should be replaced. However, no one can explain the MacBook's ability to intermittently start up & operate perfectly as if nothing were wrong with it: It can't fix itself.

I've tried these to no avail:
Mac OSX CD [hold C on startup];
Mac OSX Diagnostics [hold D on startup.."no trouble found"];
reset computer: COM+CONTROL+POWER;
reset PRAM: CMD+OPT+P+R..beep for 2+cycles;
reset SMC: disconn PS..remove battery..POWER for 5";

So I'm thinking that there may be a solder failure. After I opened the case, lifted the keyboard (still attached), and reinstalled the battery, the laptop has started successfully 25 sequential times without failing! I expected it to fail and then I could poke around for poor connections. What is going on? Any suggestions, comments?

Thanks,
haliotis888

 

[Pax]

You could try re-seating the RAM. The contacts to the RAM might have gone a bit corroded, and it won't boot without good RAM. But usually you get the sleep light flashing if RAM is bad. Remember you need to push the RAM sticks in HARD, until you have an indent in your finger.