Can magsafe port short circuit externally?

Question

Can magsafe port short circuit externally?

My macbook pro, mid-2014 15 inch retina, was on sleep with very little battery charge left in it. I noticed that a key chain's ring has stuck to the magsafe's port. I pulled the keychain out and connected the charger. The led on the charger didnt glow, neither the charging sign appeared. But the mac was still working. It eventually ran out of power and went to sleep.

Searched around in the net and saw suggestions about cleaning the port and the connector, letting the charger to settle for few hours and so on. Tried all of them but it's still not working. Also tried the resetting SPM thing, that didnt work too.

Did the magsafe port or board short circuited due to the keychain ring? Is there any other way to try to make it work?

MacBook Pro with Retina display, OS X Yosemite (10.10.3)

Posted on May 8, 2015 5:56 AM

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Answer 1

May 8, 2015 6:50 AM in response to Ralph Landry1

Hi Ralph,

The keyring was stuck on the charging port on the MBP and not the charger. Can it short circuit like that? If so, then it's a bad design as the magnet pulls lots of metallic objects when near and the chances of short circuiting are very high.

I will take the MBP and the charger to Apple store and have it checked. Thanks

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Answer 2

May 8, 2015 7:14 AM in response to GorkheyJonSnow

It would be possible to cause the charger to short and not the computer depending on the exact size and positioning of the keychain/ring at the connector. Short circuits are going to follow the path of least resistance so it is possible. The care-and-feeding of the MagSafe has been the subject of knowledge base articles from Apple for seveeral years, see: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT203207 if you do not already have a copy. There have been shorts and burning of contacts on both sides of the connection - the connector end of the cable and the connector pins on the computer.

Taking it in and having the techs test everything is a smart move...best of luck with it.

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Answer 3

May 8, 2015 6:02 AM in response to GorkheyJonSnow

It is possible for the power adapter itself to short circuit and not damage the logic board or internal circuitry of the MBPr. Best we to find out the condition is to take the MBPr and charger to an Apple store genius bar, explain what happened to the techs and have them test all of the components to see what has been damaged. It sounds like just the charger, but safe thing to do is have eveerything tested.

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