My iBook G4 won't turn on

My iBook G4 won't turn on. I was charging my iPod. I took out the iPod charger and the computer suddenly went dead. When I pushed the power button, the fan comes on but nothing else happens. I've tried taking out the battery and plugging the computer directly into the wall without the battery in it. I also tried all the troubleshooting tricks on the Apple website, and nothing has worked. I need help!

I am having this same problem. I let my iBook g4 12 inch (purchased in Jan 05) stay sleeping on low battery a few times recently and when I was later working with it the screen would go black, and after a reboot attempt I got nothing but the fan running full blast. At the suggestion of others on the internet I pinched it on the left near the track pad and it started up. Is there a permanent fix to this or is it just a matter of time before I have to kiss my laptop goodbye? How much time do I have to get all of my information off of this machine?

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Retrieving disc from dead ibook which won't turn on?

Hi. How would I go about ejecting a disc from my dead ibook? I've tried resetting the PRAM / PMU, neither will work. It won't turn on at all. I really just need to get a disc out of the disc drive. Is it possible? How would I go about doing it?
Also, is it possible to retrieve a file from the HD? (this is far less important).
Thank you!

The usual way is to hold down the mouse button as you start it up, but that probably won't work for you if it won't start up at all. But you could try anyway.
An alternative is to prop the iBook up with the slot pointed down and if you're lucky the disc will eventually drop out thanks to gravity.
Another thing that you can try--get something very thin like a business card or very thin plastic ruler and some two sided sticky tape and see if you can stick the disc and pull it out. Be sure the tape is well stuck to whatever you are using--you don't want to lose it inside the drive.
If the iBook is truly dead never to be revived, you could just take it apart until you get to the optical drive and then take that apart.
As for the hard drive, you could take it out and put it in an enclosure. It would then be an external hard drive and you could access the data on it. As long as it will spin up, you should be able to do this.
Disassembly instructions can be found at:
http://www.ifixit.com/
How come the iBook is dead? Will it just not start up, or is there some other known issue like a dead logic board? If it just won't start up, it might be worth a little troubleshooting to see if it can be revived. If you have access to an Apple Store, you could try an appointment with the genius bar and see if they can get it going, maybe with a known good power adaptor. If not, post back for help with this.
Good luck!

My iBook G4 won't turn on. Help?

I was watching a dvd on my computer last night. In the middle of it, my iBook randomly turned off. It won't turn on again. I've gone to the support sections and their solutions don't work. There isn't anything I can do at the moment to turn it on. And I have a rented dvd stuck in it! HELP!
iBook G4 Mac OS X (10.4)

I know the frustration. A similar crash occurred to me yesterday. I could hear a slight click after pressing the start button, but no whirring or start up. The front left base was warmer than I recalled from past operations, so I thought something was abnormal. I disconnected the power source to let it cool off overnight. (the power light indicated a charge was taking place). This morning I reconnected the power source, and voila, it started as it would under normal conditions. I have no idea of what happened. I checked the battery recall info, but this iBook does not qualify for replacement. In addition, the hot spot was on the opposite side of the base, and the battery itself did not show heat this morning.
Good luck!

Ibook G3 won't turn on at all after OS X 4.11 update

I downloaded OS X 4.11 and Quicktime updates a few days back. The computer rebooted after installation, and I used it for a few more hours then shut down. Since then, it won\t turn on at all. No chimes, no grey or blue screen--just no response. I have tried most of the solutions suggested on these pages: taking out the battery <which is fully charged>, resetting PRAM and PMU, various keyboard combinations--but nothing has worked. Of course the computer is not under warranty and I am overseas in Turkey, so I'm skeptical about getting any hardware fixed from here. Any help you could offer would be appreciated. For now I am just resigned to waiting several days and hoping it works again...

Hi, and welcome to Apple Discussions.
When you say you've tried all the support, do you mean you've tried everything listed in this Apple Knowledge Base article?
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=50959
If so, the last step suggest taking it in for service.
Since you live in the Bay Area, you could take it to DT & T Computer Services in Fremont. They are not Apple Authorized, but do free diagnostics, are extremely competitive in pricing on repairs, and have a six-month warranty on any repairs they do.
Good luck.

IBook G4 won't turn on

I have an iBook G4 with OS 10.3.9--it is about 5 years old. Recently I've been having a "kernel panic" issue either resulting in a multi-lingual gray box instructing me to shut my computer down, or resulting in a text screen indicating panic.
More recently, my computer simply went black and shut down of its own accord while I was working. Now it will not turn on. I have tried booting with the power button, booting by simultaneously holding down the power button and various keystrokes, but there is nothing. No fan noise or anything. The AC adaptor is plugged in and has a green light indicator. I removed and re-attached the battery as well.
If anyone has any experience with this or thoughts on troubleshooting, I would welcome it.
Thanks!

There have been a few possible sources of this kind of issue; including places on
the logic board whose solder has fractured due to heat expansion & contraction
over the life of the unit, and some users have applied a home-made shim to a few
places inside the computer to put pressure on places known to have these fractures.
Another idea is to take out the AirPort wireless card, in later iBooks, the card is part
of a wireless module with Bluetooth and internet wi-fi 802.11/g together; this is on
the logic board and held in place by a screw, and requires a procedure different than
simply removing the AirPort card from a slot beneath the keyboard on older iBooks.
If the condition changes or pertains to the AirPort card, as it has in some conditions,
then removing the card (and then attempt to use a wi-fi USB dongle as main wi-fi)
has been one way around a hardware-based kernel panic when this is the cause.
Or use Ethernet connections to a wired router to maintain internet access afterward.
One of the failure effects has a name synonymous with one of the persons who found
out what the problem was and discovered the way to fix some of them, was to shim it.
If you do a google search on iBook logicboard problems, various web site articles and
discussions come up; the same topics have been aired in Apple Discussions, too. So,
it should be easy to find corresponding stories and some ideas on resolving them here.
' iBook G4 shim fix ' - a google search result (unfiltered)
http://www.google.com/#hl=en&source=hp&q=iBookG4+shim+fix&btnG=Google+Search&aq=f&aqi=&oq=iBook+G4+shimfix&fp=8ec9ea851cee2c5b
There are a few causes for kernel panics, sometimes the problem is hardware based
and other times, it could be in software. Then again, times have shown both could be
active at the same time to create or expose a condition where the system is not able
to function due to some combination of events outside of its operational parameters.
Tech note TN2063: Understanding & Debugging Kernel Panics
http://developer.apple.com/technotes/tn2002/tn2063.html
X-Labs - Resolving Kernel Panics:
http://www.thexlab.com/faqs/kernelpanics.html
Good luck & happy computing!

(Another) iBook G4 "Won't Turn On"

Hi there, I probably appear to be yet another person who has a problem with booting up, only difference being, when I hit the power button, NOTHING happens.
A couple of days ago, I put my iBook into sleep, by closing the lid, just after I queued up Mr Jobs' latest speech on Quicktime fullscreen to watch a little later. When I returned about an hour later, the iBook's light wasn't "breathing", and when I lifted up the lid, all was a black screen. There were no normal hard drive/processor noises you'd expect from waking from sleep. It was fairly warm, but no warmer than it normally gets.
I held down the power button for ten seconds to turn it off if it was still on.
Pushed the power button, Nothing; No fan, no hard drive, no processor, no screen, no Apple noise.
The battery is charged fully - It shows four green lights.
The power adapter shows green when plugged in.
I've removed the power adapter and tried.
I've removed the battery, plugged in the power adapter and tried.
I've followed instructions to reset: PMU and PRAM/NVRAM (Not that you can with no powerup)
I've applied pressure to the left of the trackpad and tried.
I've applied pressure just left of the trackpad and tried.
I've applied pressure to the left of the trackpad button and tried.
I've applied pressure to both sides of the underneath and tried.
All of the above have been done on power adapter and battery power.
I appreciate that it's around a four (maybe even five) year-old machine now and I don't have 'AppleCare', but it has been very well looked after, and there's no obvious reason to me for it to die spontaneously...
I do plan to buy a top spec new iMac for the reason she is getting on a bit, but I'm really trying to wait until Leopard to save the extra £80 (students eh?). I have made an appointment for tomorrow evening at my local (hour-and-a-half-drive-away) Apple store to see the Geniuses, but any genuine suggestions would be VERY much appreciated.

Some additional information...
I just noticed that my Power Book will NOT boot if the battery is out. Put the battery in... boots. Take the battery out during the aborted boot process, it does the same as when the battery is in. But take the battery out and try to start or restart... nothing at all happens. Battery charges fine when in place too.
The old Macs I had used a battery for the PRAM. When it failed the computer had wacky behavior. Is this something that simple, or is there a much worse problem cropping up now? Seems like there are more than a few of us having the same vintage Power Books experiencing the same sorts of issues.
Thanks,
Steve

IBook G4 won't turn on, tried PMU reset multiple ways, what else can I do?

I'm writing about a dual USB iBook G4 without physical reset button that after a screen freeze from which I had to shut down by holding down the power button now refuses to turn on at all. I have tried resetting the PMU by pressing shift-control-option-power waiting five seconds and then pressing power again as described in the Apple article, but without success. I've done this in a variety of ways: with the battery in and out and with the A/C cord connected and disconnected. No luck. The battery is charged, so the A/C connection is working. Are there any tricks I am missing, or do I need to bring this computer to a repair shop at this point?
Anthony

After "resting" for about two hours with the battery out and the A/C unplugged I tried the PMU reset one more, then plugged in the power cord and, voila! it turned on. Now I can teach my classes again. I still don't know what the trouble was or what the solution was, but maybe sitting idle for a while was what the computer needed.

IBook G3 won't turn on

My wife has a G3 ibook running OSX (can't remember which version). Today she turned it on, it started up, then it went to sleep mode, black screen, and would not respond to the keyboard to awake. It was plugged in, and the battery was full. We tried unplugging it, taking out the battery to drain it, and then plugging it all back in (a remedy suggested by the online retailer we bought it from) but no response. Any suggestions?

No iBook has a secondary (logic board) battery.
Have you tried all the procedure outlined in the above link?
You can check out the FAQ page for the iBook Logic Board Repair Extension Program and if the symptoms look familiar, give Apple a call. If the iBook qualifies, it's a free fix.
If it is past the three-year time limit, try calling and asking for Customer Relations (NOT Customer Service--they can't help you) and ask them to please make an exception to the three-year limit in your case.
If the symptoms do not match or you are outside the three-year time limit and Apple refuses to fix it, you may want to consider sending it to DT & T Computer Services. They do free diagnostics, offer a six-month warranty, and charge $195-$265 for the logic board repair (depending on which model it is) plus shipping to and from Fremont, California. This is the most reasonable price and best warranty I've found online for the repair.
Good luck.

IBook G4 won't Turn on completely.

I just picked up a used iBook G4. I have charged the battery fully, but when I press the power button, the Optical drive spins up, and I hear a very quiet, long, solid tone, and then nothing. The optical drives stops spinning, and the unit is silent. Pressing the power button a 2nd time does nothing, holding the power button for 30 seconds still does nothing.
There seems to be a CD in the drive, but all attempts to eject it have failed. Pressing the eject button yields no effect, and neither does holding the mouse button while powering on. When attempting a PMU reset, there is no obvious response from the unit, except that the battery will stop charging if it was on the charger.
Another oddity, is that the Caps-lock button seems to repeatedly toggle the caps lock light on and off very quickly. The number-lock doesn't respond, but the volume-up button toggles the num-lock light on and off, just like the caps-lock button does to the caps-lock light.
There is nothing displayed on the LCD screen or on an external monitor connected to the Mini-VGA to VGA adapter. no backlight either. If I try holding the 'T' button when starting up, and connecting to another iBook via FireWire 400 cable, then no additional drives show up on the other iBook.
Any insight into this? I'm thinking I'l just have to replace the Motherboard, but if anyone knows of a quick-fix, then that will save me allot of hassle!!
TIA!
--Aaron

256 MB RAM is installed, and works fine in my 14" iBook. The (non-working) 12" iBook also has 256 MB soldered to the motherboard. I get the same result with and without the additional RAM.
On another note, a friend of mine has an identical unit without a charger, and a bad battery. He was going to toss it out. The battery and charger on mine are fine, however. So I think I have this problem under control. It's not the resolution for which I was hoping, but it should work-out.

IBook Won't turn Off.

Yes, Werid, But My iBook G3 won't turn off. When i Go and click on the apple To "log off, Restart, Sleep Or Shut down" The menu closes and The computer Stays on and does not shut down. I then force Quit all the Programs Runing, And tryed to shut down again, No shut down.
I have to Press and hold the power button And hold it til' it shuts down or Remove the Battery.
I know this is not good for the Hard Drive so I run Safe Boot Regerly, But I really what it to shut down again.
Can anyone help me?
iBook G3, 128MB RAM, 30GB HD,12"in.,800MHz, Dual usb, 10.3.9

Do you have to use Force Quit to quit applications? Can you quit applications normally (from the Menu Bar contextual drop-down or using Command + q)?
Do you still have your OS 9 startup volume? If you're not sure, go to System Preferences > Startup Disk and see if it shows up as a startup option. If it does, select it as your startup disk and shut down. Then start up in OS 9 and see if you are able to shut down normally from there. (This eliminates the possibility of a hardware problem if you are able to shut down normally in OS 9.)
If you no longer have the OS 9 installation, try creating a new user (System Preferences > Accounts). Log out and log in as the new user. Is the new user able to shut down normally?

Replacement battery won't turn on ibook

Have a used 14" ibook g4 that was only operable when power supply connected. replaced battery today and now won't turn on at all. bought new replacement from reliable third party vendor. has 4 indicator l.e.d.'s but not operating machine at all. Here's the interesting part. Swiped battery from my brothers 12" ibook g4 and held in place on contacts (obviously wouldn't stay in on its own due to smaller size) and machine turned on and booted up properly. Thoughts?

You may have received a bad battery. Contact the vendor (might I ask who they are?) and see if you can get another replacement.
~Lyssa

IBook won't turn on, but fan is running

Okay, I have an iBook w/a recalled battery, which I have already requested. I am waiting for that to come in. Upon the suggestion of the apple website, I have removed my bad battery and am running my laptop solely from the a/c adapter. However, now my comp. won't turn on. The fan is running, but nothing else is happening. Also, I have followed the advice of apple's tech support link, but that has not done any good. Per their advise, I put in the Software Install and Restore disc, and now I can't get it to eject. I need help asap, if anyone has any anwers. Thanks

Hi, and welcome to Apple Discussions.
From the Apple Knowledge Base article on troubleshooting slot load drives:
The drive doesn't eject discs
If the drive ejects discs slowly or appears to be struggling, insert and eject a disc several times.
If the drive does not eject discs, press the F12 key. Holding down the trackpad button during startup should also eject a disc.
Reset the parameter RAM (PRAM) and/or the Power Manager (PMU). PMU reset instructions for iBook G4/PowerBook G4.
If the disc still does not eject, contact Apple to arrange for service.
I hope something there helps.

G4 ibook won't turn on the power cord stays orange and won't charge the bat

I plugged my g4 ibook in and it turned the computer
off, I am in Ghana and used a surge protector but
think this might be the reason. I have tried
resetting the PMU and the orange indicator light on
the power cord blinks green when I do this but then
nothing happens. The battery on the bottom only one
light lights up when pushing the battery button. Has
anyone else had this problem.
In addition I removed the battery and the power indicator light went to green without the battery in and the power in it, but absolutely nothing. Replaced the battery and nothing. Please help I am in Ghana, and have no way to get help!!!

Hey Ryan,
Can you hear drumming [I studied with a Ghanian master from the Univ. there for 5 years and have a few hand carved djembes which are awesome].
I'm hoping that will divert you because you're not likely to find a new adapter there but that's undoubtedly the problem. I bent the prong on one slightly and it did the same thing, it's possible yours is like that. If you don't have any knowledge of it being bent it probably happened inadvertently, so you might try letting it sit out in the hot African sun until the gold is very malable then just run your fingers round the prong very lightly try to align it. I tried all night and this didn't work but it did get the thing closer so it might work for you.
Here's a link to a very good price where I got my replacement and it's good $38: http://store.shentech.com/ap24v145wsqs.html

My iBook won't turn on! PLEASE HELP!

I was having problems with the CD drive last week, then, this morning, I went to turn him back on and he won't turn on. I push the power button and he starts to start, but nothing happens. The processor starts whirring and doesn't stop until I remove the power source. I had this problem in March (I only got the computer last august) and took him to the Apple store, he was shipped in and they replaced his processor. My real question (since I already know what the problem is) is that even though my warranty ran out last month, should the processor that was only installed 6 months ago still be covered. Because if not, that is pretty crappy that every 6 months my computer seems to break in the SAME WAY...could there be something wrong with the rest of the comp that is causing this? Does anyone have any suggestions?

I called the 1.800.My.Apple number and asked for customer relations. He asked why I needed to talk to them, I told him, he said that they wouldn't be of any help. He said he could transfer me to tech support, but since I don't have apple Care it would cost $50. So he said he could give the website to go on to ship it or give me the number of the closest service tech. I told him I didn't need to talk to a service tech, I needed to talk to someone about the fact that I shouldn't have to pay for the processor breaking TWICE in one year. (It is my theory that it has something to do with this defective/overheating battery. Maybe the battery over heated and caused damage to the processor.) The only thing he said he could do was give me the service tech guy. He seemed like he felt bad for not being able to help me...but, that doesn't really do me any good. What should I do? If I call this service tech guy, he'll charge me, he won't care because the "twice in a year" thing isn't his problem. And, if I send it in...how am I supposed to say "Ok...fix this but I won't pay for it!" That is something I need to establish before hand. The only thing I can think of is taking it to the apple store, but the closest one is a 2.5 hour drive! and, what can they do. Any suggestions? I don't know what to do and I have to get this computer fixed.

IBOOK shut down and won't turn on

My I book G4 is 6 months old. I was watching a DVD last night and it just turned off without warning that the battery was low (it wasn't plugged in though). I plugged it to charge and tried to restart it but it won't turn on...at all!!! The light is now green around the batterie plug but NO matter how long or how hard I press on the start button, nothing happens...like NOTHING. No fan noiose, no screen.... HELP !

Try starting it with only the power adapter plugged in and no battery. Try holding ctrl and cmd key (apple key) while pressing the power button.

My iBook G4 won't turn on

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