I live on a US sailboat right now off the coast of New Zealand. My Mac will only recognize power input from a land-based source. It will not charge from either a 110 or 220 outlet on the boat. Any suggestions?

The two MBPs that I have function flawlessly on my boat. I have a Xantrex Pro Sine 2.0 feeding electrons to the MBPs. This is a pure sine wave inverter and put out 'clean' 120 v AC power. I have on few occasions had the older MBP (2006) hooked to a modified sine wave inverter and there were no difficulties with its operation.

It would seem to me that you should try another power adapter or another MBP and see what the results are.

Ciao.

OGELTHORPE wrote:

It would seem to me that you should try another power adapter or another MBP and see what the results are.

Ciao.

That too is another thing I would suggest. It could possibly be that particular adapter could be defective. If this is something you haven't tried, it's the cheapest place to start.

but it will not charge on the boat.

Same problem in the SF bay area. I can charge from the shore power from the dock, but not from the batteries on both MacBook and a MBAir offshore. 😟

When the Apple Power adapters fail, they generally develop one of two loose connections. The most common, especially on older models, is an internal fraying of the DC power cord about two inches from the power brick. Newer models with the stiffer rubbery DC power cord are somewhat resistant to that problem, but the L-shaped head sometimes becomes loose internally, such that it can be rotated about the cord more than a few degrees.

The point is that both of these problems can provide intermittent connections. Your power adapter may be failing, but the way you place it when you use it on land makes it work ok, the way you place it on the boat fails. If you wiggled the cord around more, it might just behave differently.

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The computer itself is looking for 16.5 Volts DC at the end of the Magsafe connector. If you cannot provide the full 85 Watts, it will run, but not charge until you shut it down.

Several people have suggested you get an automotive type accessory power adapter [instead of the Apple 110/220 AC power adapter] and use it to switch your 12 Volts DC shipboard battery up to 16.5 Volts straight into the computer. This bypasses all the problems with sine waves, Ground fault Interrupters, and all that other BS with the AC power, and bypasses the Apple Power Adapter as well.

Please understand that I make no pretenses to being a qualified electrician. That is one of the reasons for the Xantrex Pro Sine inverter selection on my part. It produces a pure sine wave output that is equal to or better than your shore side t. It is idiot proof (which is a requirement for me) unlike a modified sine wave inverter which can destroy some electronic devices. Within limits this particular inverter will convert any electrical input to a steady 110/120 AC output.

You may very well have a pure sine wave inverter, thus this could not be viewed as a solution. If not it may be, but these inverters were not cheap when I purchased it and I have no reason to believe that has changed. I do not wish you to spend a lot of money on what may not be the solution to your problem.

Regarding you current shore power, I would be curious what the output is. If you have a volt/ohm meter, stick the test leads in there and see what you get. I also would be interested to know what the output is on your ship board 110 outlets (from the inverter). Also let me know the type of inverter you have (model, manufacturer).

Ciao.

http://www.barebones.com/ Textwrangler can help you edit everything offline, and preview in a web browser without going online. Best of all, it is only for the Mac, and it is free.

This is the kind of 12V DC to 16.5V DC converter I had in mind:

http://www.amazon.com/GPK-Charger-Macbook-Portable-Notebook/dp/B0056QBQNI/ref=sr _1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1334795131&sr=8-4

I think that's a good suggestion, and I've already suggested a DC-DC converter as well as an in-between battery, but topic starter seems into keeping the mystery alive.

Grant Bennet-Adler, greetings: I have wanted a device like that for a long time and I remember it was brought up on another post a few months ago. (It was claimed by one of the frequent forum participantsin his response that it was infringing on Apples patents, ie. the magnetic end, suggesting that the device has illegal. I can only speculate as to the validity of that issue).

The more important issue is whether if it will charge the MBP or will it just tend to extend the battery life similar to the one Apple sells for airplanes (or maybe lets the battery drain anyway but slower). Apple does not have this or a similar device in their store and if they did, I would purchase one in a heart beat. Until I see some definitive information that this or other such items work, I am loath to expose my MBPs to them.

I like the idea but I do have reservations.

Ciao.

I've heard about the patent issue too, but the wierd thing is that replacement MagSafe chargers have been popping up all over the place. I can't really rhyme that with the hassle that HyperJuice seems to go through (with their Magic Box) to avoid that particular patent issue.

Also, the one review on Amazon says it charges his MB, for what it's worth.

"It sounds ridiculous that this could be the problem and that Apple's system is so finicky if this is the problem."

There are reason that a computer (as comparedd to, let's say, an electric toothbrush) is finicky. I'm sure that you've read about computers with batteries that have cuaght fire. To prevent that from happening, the battery is charged very carefully, and any problem will cause the power adapter to shut down. So, line and frequency fluctuations and interruptions in milliseconds will cause the power adapter to shut down. The GFI will trip if there is an abnormality in the grounding scheme. The MBP will work without a ground - it's not recommended, but it will work. An open GFI breaker will remove power, and it must be manually reset - it does not reset automatically. Since you did not mention that you needed to reset a GFI, I assumed that wasn't involved with the problem. Another poster mention UPS, or power conditioner. I mentioned "line conditioner". As someone once commented, "Six of one, and a half-dozen of the other." A $100 device will likely fix the problem.

An electrician not finding the problem is not a surprise. A voltmeter is not likely to find a 50V spike that's only 2mS in length. Too, if the power adapter LED is not amber, it is not charging. Bon voyage!

I was looking at specifications and reviews for UPS as my 4-year-old 750VA APC was reporting "not enough left in battery". I noted reviews that some Dells have issues due to the UPS creating "synthesized sine wave" power signal instead of pure sine wave, probably due to the method required to buffer/slow-feed power during low-voltage and power-spike conditions.

Not sure if hat helps, but it seemed possibly more than coincidental.

I never noticed any issue when my MBP was plugged into that UPS, but then the UPS is mainly for the tower systems and router/DSL-moem in the basement where I *usually* am not with my MBP.

I read somewhere in another forum post that battery charging is a "black art" - because there are quite a few variables and its difficult to exactly say how much power goes through an adapter.

I have a MBP 60W magsafe too, sailboat, a cheap maplin 300W modified sine wave converter (not the expesive true) AND same problems. Have been searching and looking for an alternative solution to the OBVIOUS one which is buying a MikeGuyver modified 12V magsafe charger for 80 USD (suppplied an old magsafe). Shipping is expensive though (50USD) and timeconsuming.

The first obvious problem that I havnt seen mentioned yet-- is a lack of grounding (and the resulting computer/charger hum). Thats what the 3rd plug in the magsafe plug is for. On a sailboat (truck or caravan) working with 12Vs there usually no ground. That mean the surplus power generated will not go through the remaining plug (and into the ground) but through the computer, into the water (or through the chasis of the car/truck into the ground).

With a proper grounding there seems to be much higher chances of getting a 12V system to work through an inverter.

But that's a problem because you cant get it on a boat.

I noticed that mine will not charge if 0%, but will charge if sort of above 20-30%. Indicating that the first part of the charging process draws a lot of power and the remaining deosnt. The magsafe adapter seems to be flimsy especially when drawing a lot of power alas.

So now I just run the computer to about 40% and then recharge. However there are times when fulll and still no charge.

For sure a pure sine wave is better - but also significantly costlier (if getting a 300W inverter) than e.g. the MikeGuyver kit.

Im pretty sure though that the cheap Maplin 300W modified sine wave broke the internal power on my PC (HP mini2140) - with too much surplus amps, so its not recommendable in the long run.