Battery/Adapter Trouble

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Battery/Adapter Trouble

I bought my ibook used off ebay and have had no problems with it. This morning however when I tried to use the battery it only had 8% left and when I plugged in the adapter the icon changed to charging look, but it says "Calculating" next to it and doesn't charge the battery at all. It doesn't lose power (ie use the battery) but neither does the battery charge.

Any thoughts? Thanks!

imac, Mac OS X (10.4.9)

Posted on Jan 22, 2008 9:45 AM

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Answer 1

Duane

Level 10

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Jan 22, 2008 10:27 AM in response to Paul DeC

Have you tried resetting the PMU?

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Answer 2

Paul DeC Author

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Jan 22, 2008 12:07 PM in response to Duane

Thanks. I tried this and it didn't seem to have any effect. Any other thoughts?

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Answer 3

Paul DeC Author

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Jan 25, 2008 1:09 PM in response to Paul DeC

I replaced the battery and still no luck. The battery icon cannot calculate the time left on the battery or the time needed to recharge it (it's not recharging) but it can and does tell me the percentage of the life left in the battery. It's time to revisit the Geniuses (who sold me the battery to begin with). Before I go back, any words?

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Answer 4

Jan 28, 2008 2:29 PM in response to Paul DeC

Paul,
I have the exact same issue with my late 2004 iBook G4 14". About 3 weeks ago it started shutting off for no reason. If I took the battery out completely, then put it back in, then do a PMU reset, it would fix it for a week or so. So I took it to the genius bar yesterday and they ran a diagnostic and it showed it was not a hardware related issue, then sent me on my way. Now some really weird things are happening as described by you. But now if I take my battery out completely, it will not even turn on. If you go to you system profiler and look at the power settings, this is what mine looks like, does yours look the same?
Battery Installed = Yes
First Low.. = No
Full Charge Capacity = 3898
Remaining Capacity(mAh) = 424
Amperage = 0
Voltage = 14294
Cycle count = 84
AC Adapter cannot charge battery = Yes
AC Charger Watts = 26
Connected = Yes
Charging = No

What does yours look like?
Tracy

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Answer 5

Jan 29, 2008 2:46 PM in response to RajinCajun

Update 1/29 - Ok, I bought a new apple certified battery and tried that last night, and the problem did not go away. So then I exchanged the battery for an apple certified new charger and it is now charging correctly. But if I move the jack around a little bit it will die. So I think my issue is both the adapter and the jack is faulty. But I think I'll just be real careful to not jar the jack while it is plugged in. If I was you, I'd try a new adapter. I went to the store and returned my battery in exchange for an adapter, and asked their service guys if I could just open it at the store and plug it in to test. If it wouldn't have worked, I would just return it immediately, and my next item to troubleshoot would be replacing the jack. Anyway, good luck to you!
Tracy

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