Chosen Solution
Hi Everyone. I’ve got a question about a 1.5 GHz PowerBook G4 (A1095) that won’t charge its battery. Immediately after the computer is booted, the battery is recognized, but is listed as “Not Charging”. A few minutes later, it disappears, and the status changes to “No Battery”. At first, I thought that the (rather old) battery had finally died. However, when we swapped in a new battery, it had exactly the same problem as the original battery, indicating that something is probably wrong with the computer itself. I’ve tried resetting the PMU, as well as booting off of a different disk, so it’s unlikely to be a software issue. I could see this being either a logic board problem or a DC board problem, and I was wondering if anyone had a guess as to which one it might be (or if the problem might be something else). A quick visual inspection inside the machine didn’t yield any obvious information (e.g., visibly failed components). If it helps to narrow it down at all, both the logic board and the DC board have small preexisting problems. The logic board has the all-too-common dead memory slot, and the power socket is slightly loose (i.e., the AC adapter sometimes requires a bit of fiddling to yield an illuminated LED, thus providing an excellent illustration as to why MagSafe was a good idea). Thanks very much. Cheers, Jonathan
I would replace the battery connector cable: [linked product missing or disabled: IF154-033-1] UPDATE Given that we don’t have any other place to go (or symptoms I don’t know about?) It’s the logical and cheapest fix to try. See if you can tighten the screws on the DC-IN port. If it’s the outer ring on the plug in jack that has spread, wrap some wire (like muli-strand cord wire) around it and slowly tighten the wire by twisting to close to spread.
