2011 MacBook Pro won't turn on... At all.

Tips of unplugging battery from logic board works! Easy breezy, my MBP battery was fully charged when this happened because of defective ipad cable and I was not willing to wait for months till battery is going to be drained completely.

unscrew back, locate connector, unplug, wait 60 sec or so, plug it back, and whola, it is back in business.🙂

whole process took probably less than 5 min, spend more time recording which screw goes where and cleaning inside bit with air duster

Great tips➕

i had the exact same problem, and i too can't afford to repair mine as well, i let my laptop full die ( ironic considering it seems to be lifeless) mine took about 2 days of nothing no buttons would work or other chargers, so like i said i let it die and plugged it in quickly everyday to see if the light would change and if it didn't would unplug by the third day i plugged it in and was so happy when my light turned green then orange with no picker at all as a matter of fact I'm typing this on the computer right now, sometimes patience is key ( i would still schedule a appointment at apple tho)

i had the exact same problem, i let my laptop full die ( ironic considering it seems to be lifeless) mine took about 2 days of nothing no buttons would work or other chargers, so like i said i let it die and plugged it in quickly everyday to see if the light would change and if it didn't would unplug by the third day i plugged it in and was so happy when my light turned green then orange with no picker at all as a matter of fact I'm typing this on the computer right now, sometimes patience is key ( i would still schedule a appointment at apple tho)

How I brought my 2011 MacBook Pro back to life! I thought it was literally dead gone. What happened to me was I put in a what I thought an original Samsung 3.0 travel charger and as it turns out it was a fake cheap knock off and as soon as I plug it in to charge my phone I heard a faint swish.. After it was black out city nothing worked tried SMC reset and nothing I feared the worst! I seriously thought that the cable shorted my mother board. So what I did was take the back cover off and unplugged the battery and put my finger on the power button held it there for 10 seconds and repeated it again and then reconnected the battery and said a prayer and hit the power button and Voila!!! The fabulous Apple ding and she was up and running like a champ again.

Moral all of the story be careful about cheap chargers that may appear to be genuine but in fact are fake and can damage you Mac.........

lesson son learned the hard way hope this helps:)

P.S I did not wait 30 plus hours for my battery to die that worthless advice.

Thanks! That's exactly what I had to do and lo and behold! it worked.

My 13" MacBook Pro [seemed] dead. It wouldn't turn on, and had the 'dim green light' while charging issue.

I read the posts here, and even took it in to the Apple store. They offered to fix my motherboard (logic board), for a cool grand, so I kindly declined their offer, and took my computer home.

After about a month, and out of plain curiosity, I plugged in the mag-safe and the green light was back to full strength. Computer turned on, and has been working great ever since. No issues with battery either, it charges and keeps a charge - just fine. I had completely written this computer off, and now it works again. I (even) almost sold it for $100 on eBay.

So just as a heads-up to you folks out there. Patience is a virtue. You'll save yourself a ton of money, not to mention your sanity, if you just leave it alone for a while. Come back to it once the internal battery has completely drained to 0% - and then try it again. If it still doesn't work, and only then should you even consider spending $1000 to replace an old logic board.

Cheers! And thanks for all the help here guys.

~Andrej

I've been through the run around with this issue and now know exactly what it is. It is essentially a short that occurs in one of the USB's (the one closest to me is the one that keeps doing it) and it occurs with certain cables only. the best quick fix is to remove the baseplate of your laptop and find the battery connector and pry it off the motherboard with a little leverage from your fingernail. Then reconnect it back in place. For some reason disconnecting the battery and reconnecting it fixes the issue immediately. Hope this helps.

I learned that not all Apple "geniuses" are not always geniuses. One time when they told me my motherboard had failed, I got a second opinion at our local computer shop that has a good Apple technician. Turned out it was just the screen. Replaced it for about $90. I've noted, since Steve Jobs died, the old fashioned "insanely great service" at Apple took a nose-dive over the cliff. When Jobs was alive, almost everything was fixed for free at the Genius bar or replaced if they couldn't fix it. If there was a major problem, the cost for repairs was very reasonable. Moreover, they didn't care how old the Apple computer product was or where you bought it—they just fixed it. That's why I used to tell hundreds of people that is why you paid more for the Apple product. This bought Apple millions of dollars of FREE word of mouth advertising. Today I'm not so sure I would purchase another Apple computer. I would probably buy a Dell 17" laptop as it appears as though they are catering to the video producers like Apple used to do. In fact, we bought our grandson a Dell laptop for about $800 after his 15" MacBookPro went south, and he said he likes it better than the Apple MacBookPro. Sad to see as I've owned Apple computers since the first desktop computer that helped me launch my own successful community newspaper in N. CA. that I sold in 2005.

Yes, you can include me as another person who is very grateful to have found this thread and am adding my story to this thread hoping it might help someone out there. My story:

• After syncing my iPhone 6 with a 3rd party (Belkin) USB cable (that actually came as part of a car charger), my early 2011 MacBook Pro was dead!

• Took it to the Apple Store and after they did a trouble shoot on it (to no avail) told me that I needed to replace the motherboard and it would cost me $310 Dollars (the price they came up with is quite interesting after reading all of the posts here as I believe they base their repair price off of a certain percentage of what they think the computer is worth - basically a "sweet spot" that is just enough under the value of the re-sale value of the computer to make it tempting but enough so they can make some $ off of you - this is a whole other story / thread in the making...).

• I was glad that I decided I needed to sleep on it!

• When I got home that evening I tried again to see if I could start up and that is when I noticed the faint glow from the power cable. That prompted me to do a little searching online which is when, to my amazement, I found this thread that described the exact issue!

• It was actually not until I read through this thread that I recognized the cause of the issue - the 3rd party Belkin cable that I used for the sync just before the computer shut down.

• Upon waking the next day (24 hours from the meltdown), the computer was still unresponsive so I embarked on the "disconnecting the battery" fix.

• I needed to keep the battery unplugged from the motherboard for much longer than I expected - a few minutes - which I am guessing was because the capacitors needed to discharge or something to that effect. Anyhow, after a few minutes I tried the AC cable and she was back in action!

• Once I got the computer re-started my battery life was at 91% after 24 hours of sitting there. So I am guessing I would've been waiting for several more days if I was going to attempt the "let the battery drain" method.

• I did a p-ram re-boot first thing once it started up and the time / date was re-set from disconnecting the battery.

• No data lost and no ill effect from the USB short or the repair.

My frustration with Apple is that, even after spending my whole day waiting and then getting helped by a "qualified" technician at an Apple Store, they did not have the training or resource prowess to take some simple steps that would have solved the issue quickly:

1) Ask me what I am now humbly remembering as a golden first question to ask when trouble shooting ALL technology: "Did you do something different that you don't normally do when using "x" right before the problem appeared?" That question would have pointed directly to the 3rd party cable!

2) I am shocked by this whole experience in that it is obvious the Apple Store is NOT using any kind of online search options or support database to find out if such a problem already exists and what the solution might be. They went right for the "nuclear option" of, "You need a new motherboard". I have found that to be the case with the phone support too. When I have called to address Mac or iPhone issues it seems a little too quick that the solution is becoming, "You need to do an erase and install". Yes, easy for you to say - do you have an extra day or two of time I can borrow? 😀

The biggest learning for me from this is to FIRST (before I bring my computer ANYWHERE to get looked at) do my own much more extensive at home trouble shooting and online research.

Hope this helps Mac friends!

~ Antonio ~

Thank you for your post, it worked on my 2011 MBP!

hello

DId it work? how did your battery run out of energy? How long it last? Thank you

Thank you so much for your detailed, response.. you guys are legends !

I just faced the same issue, I'm here in KSA .. I hope Apple support guys would have solution rather than paying hundreds of dollars for a motherboard, or waiting for a couple of days until my battery is drained.

I will keep yall posted, really disappointed at Apple !

Just had this problem. Unplugged battery cable for ~20 minutes and plugged it back in. Seems to be doing okay now! Whew!

I can turn mine on again this way but how are you guys getting the battery to charge again? I actually had my battery replaced and it still won't charge.

I need some help guys 😟

I tried unplugging the battery for a few moments and popping it back in, but only starts while the power adapter is connected.

The laptop then runs fine UNTIL I shut it down. Once I shut it down, it doesn't power back up, UNLESS I do the unplugging of the battery again.

The battery charges perfectly fine. When the power adapter is plugged in, it shows the orange 'charging' light.

The laptop just doesn't come on without those steps. Can anybody help me!? 😟

Edit: If it helps, I have a Macbook Pro 2011

I have a third party battery pack for my iPhone that charges from USB ports or USB power adapters. Yesterday afternoon, getting ready for an overseas business trip tomorrow, I connected the battery pack to one of the USB ports on my 13" Late 2011 MacBook Pro (one of the ones with the non-removable battery). The MBP went instantly dead. It was totally unresponsive to the power button or any combination of keys that I could think of. Though the MagSafe cable was connected to power the battery charge indicator was black - not even a weak amber light. The above explanation that my cheap device had created a short seems reasonable.

I searched and found todavidjensen's solution above:

For some reason disconnecting the battery and reconnecting it fixes the issue immediately.

That is, disconnecting the non-removable battery by flicking up the connector to the motherboard. I found a video that showed how to do it:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_bCgzOsijYs

I found other videos that added particular boot routines, but this simple disconnect-reconnect method worked perfectly for me. Once completed, just reattach the MBP's back panel and boot. Once booted, I connected the Magsafe connector and the charge light was back to normal, initially green then amber as it started to charge. There may have been a slight pause until the light showed, or I may not have connected correctly.

No data was lost, and the clock was correct when I looked.

Anyway, this thread was such a lifesaver! Given my overseas trip tomorrow, I envisaged having to leave my computer behind me for repairs, which would have made work nigh on impossible. Thanks to everybody!