Chosen Solution

Replaced HD in MacMini late 2014 with SSD. Can’t find a place to plug in the IR Sensor cable. Looks like it should go under the board, but there’s nothing there. Some photos show a open box form, but not on this mother board. For now going to leave it unhooked and see if it runs?

Now I see your plight! When you disconnected the LED/IR sensor you really did disconnect it the hard way! Compare these two images: Your board

A good board

Carefully peel the base off of the cable connector half and then take a picture of the bottom side so we can see how the solder contacts look and post it here for us to see.

Hi Leonard! Did it work without connecting the IR cable? Thanx

My board looked just like Leonard J’s after I removed this cable while putting in an SSD. The demo video I watched on YouTube said to be gentle with it but did not instruct sufficiently to avoid this damage. It took a long time for me to discover that the socket which should have remained on the board had come off with the cable - I had inadvertently pried it off. It was so thin and hard to see that it appeared to be part of the cable plug. Apple and their authorized dealers would not repair it but instead order a whole new board - $$$$! I took it to a small local shop and the guy soldered it back on. It took him two tries before the power indicator light would come on again. Since I had taken things apart already, he was willing to solder it for $50 but when I discovered the light wasn’t working after the first try and it needed to be redone, I had him finish the job - put it all back together and format the hard drive, and load the OS - as I didn’t want to take a chance on having to take things apart again and increase the chances of breaking something else. The whole thing cost me $130. So with a $140 new SSD and the repair, I still came in almost $200 less than what the Apple authorized repair quoted for the drive and installation. Now I hope to use my late 2014 Mac mini for at least a couple more years if not longer. For anyone considering buying or running a Mac mini without the power indicator light - I found it very difficult to know whether the machine was on or off or how long it was taking to shut down so that I could restart it.

They work just fine without it.

Hi, what happens if you are not able to solder/put back the IR cable? Is it accurate that only the Power Light and the IR Sensor in front will be the only functionality lost?

Sorry to disagree. It also happened to me . On this board there is no such connector. There are 2 tiny metal goldplates where the connector connects to the board. I’m stuck here with the same problem. Any ideia? Thanx