Titanium Powerbook g4 won't boot

After that long without any activity, the main battery would be dead

and beyond holding a charge; so a replacement is recommended.

Also, certain models of the PowerBook require a secondary small

battery on logic board commonly called a 'clock' or 'pram' battery.

This likely has also failed, and would require skilled replacement.

You would need to better identify the PowerBook model.

You could probably order these parts from OWC macsales or another

company with inventory of parts for older & obsolete Mac portables.

And a http://iFixit.com repair guide may be helpful to see how it's built.

Further testing & troubleshooting may be required by a trained tech

who has PPC product knowledge and repair experience, to be sure.

There are other parts that could have failed, such as DC-in Board.

There are resets to try such as Power Management Unit (PMU)

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1431 and About NVRAM & PRAM

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1379

However certain aspects of the resets rely on the ability to start the unit.

So troubleshooting can only go so far, without a charged good battery

and known good power adapter; and AC power to run tests. Do you

still have the original software install-restore DVD set it came with?

Good luck & happy computing! 🙂

The 'charger port' is where the DC-in Board is located, behind that port.

To fix the port implies replacement of the port on small circuit behind it.

Does the power adapter DC plug have an illuminated end that changes

color from yellow to green, etc? If that has it, and that is working it does

indicate power; however do not expect the dead battery to charge up.

http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/apple_laptop/batteries/PowerBook_G4_15_Ti

http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/powerbook-ibook-macbook/

The computer may start without the battery in, if it could start up at all.

Some users leave the battery in there, and then let the computer set

and try to charge for maybe 10 hours. This is to see if there can be

enough power stored to get around the failed backup or clock battery.

(To try the PRAM reset, according to instruction, may help. Could be

the original hard disk drive may also be shot. It could be froze up.)

After doing some backward research, your PowerBook G4 model is the

first build-model G4 series PowerBook. It also has a pram/clock battery

on the logic board, that if dead, may disallow the computer from startup

even if the main power cell is good and has a charge. The old battery is

very unlikely to sustain any viable charge capability after so many years.

PowerBook G4 info - http://mactracker.ca free database download spec

{The part number for the backup battery is 922-4361 -- this is a tiny cell

on the logic board, and requires a tedious take-apart to access it... and

it may be possible to disconnect this battery, to get the PB to start.}

The system software you have hopefully is the correct original disc set

since they are hard or almost impossible to buy, they are series specific.

You could get and run as new as Tiger OS X 10.4.11, w/ 1024MB RAM.

{specs cited from http://mactracker.ca database}

Original system discs usually include an Apple Hardware Test.

So that should be among the artifacts you have with it.

You may have to look around for a backup clock battery

and someone to install it; there are online sources for

parts, such as powerbookmedic, wegenermedia, OWC.

The computer is old enough to hope some Apple Specialist

or independent repairer with experience in older Macs is

within your area, or consider mailing it away to one.

Part of the process now, to troubleshoot why it won't work

invites various partial repair & parts replacement to test it.

Perhaps that may end up also needing a new hard drive.

If so, that requires an Ultra ATA/66 (ATA-5) compatible HD.

•PowerBook G4 Titanium (Mercury) Repair Guide: iFixit.com

http://www.ifixit.com/Device/PowerBook_G4_Titanium_Mercury

Information on parts, placement, and access are in the guide.

However these are tedious and unskilled unfamilar efforts to

attempt a repair could cause additional damages & so as to

make the original issue(s) harder to diagnose & further repair.

Not sure how much any of this helps...

Good luck & happy computing! 🙂

PS:

I've found the dc board is not necessarily a separate part

in your specific model; these things were built differently

as time went on.

As I've read more, above timed about, so I'm adding here

suggestions on PowerBook not powering up:

http://www.ifixit.com/Answers/View/687/No+power

The 'backup battery' should be in the area of this PMU unit,

http://www.ifixit.com/Guide/PowerBook+G4+Titanium+Mercury+PMU+Replacement/66

{At some point, you may find it easier to get a great deal

on later model, clean, MacBook 13-inch from 2009/2010!}

Hopefully you can make it work...

Good luck 🙂

Given the older ATA/IDE would not be compatible inside many new external enclosures since they are SATA and the older ATA is also known as PATA (parallel ATA, vs Serial ATA) you may need to get a Universal USB Hard Drive Adapter that plugs into a bare HDD and gives it power, and only wires attach, so it has a power supply of its own and wires to hook up the bare hard drive to a computer with USB connection. I believe macsales.com has one, but most computer stores should have something like it, rather generic and if you ask to be sure, (or see it written) the product should be able to connect to ATA/IDE drives.

This should make the old drive appear as an external hard disk,

as a temporary connection to see if you can get files off of there.

{Not sure what kind of luck you'd have if you took that old of a Mac

to an Apple Store (with appointment) and talk to a Genius, where

available. That'd be a free discussion, and if they did attempt a

diagnostic, in the US & Canada, the effort is said to be 'free.'}

Hopefully you can get one to work, if nothing else. 🙂