Solid Sleep Light

Last week, my sleep light suddenly went from pulsing normally to staying on and solid from the moment I boot up. I can put the computer to sleep (the hard drive and display spin down, and when I wake it, I get the "wake up" whir and spinning of the HD), but the light doesn't pulse. It sounds like a circuit is being interrupted or something.
It's probably connected to the incident that happened at the same time: I got the ever-terrifying flashing folder with a question mark icon on startup at the same time. The first time I loaded from the Mac OS install disc, the Hardware Test didn't see my HD. However, after restarting a few times, it reappeared. I rebooted from the install disc and repaired the HD, and repaired permissions (a boot permission file seems to have been corrupted, somehow), and then reinstalled Mac OSX and re-upgraded to get everything up and running. Now the system is running fine (and it is faithfully backed up on an external HD, thank goodness) and I have Norton running, so I know it's not a virus.
Back to the sleep light - is this a hardware problem?

I took apart the lower case and ran a hair dryer on very low heat at the area. A few days later, the sleep light started pulsing again. Guess there was some moisture in there after all.

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Solid sleep light - not pulsing

Didn't want to just tack this onto another question, and I didn't see any answers when I searched here, so I hope no one minds another thread.
What does it mean when the sleep light stays on, but doesn't pulse like it does when it's sleeping? The only reference to the light at all in the manual is about it pulsing when the computer sleeps. We had a day when the light just stayed on solid after we (supposedly) shut down. I think we just figured it was in some standby mode, but in searching here, I'm betting we didn't let the computer shut down totally, because we had a heck of a time restarting it.
All's well now, and there seem to be no other issues (yet), but you'd think there's be some reference to the light staying solid in the troubleshooting section of the manual. I hope we didn't do any damage, but as I said, it's been running fine since. Has anyone else seen a solid glowing light?

If the light is on constantly, but the screen is
black, then the screen is asleep, but the computer
itself isn't, formerly Don.
The most probable cause is that you shut the screen
before shutdown of the computer had completed, but
there can be other reasons for a failed shutdown.
Its a good idea to keep an eye on such things,
because you can end up in a situation where, for
example, the procesor is still running when you put
the computer in a bag, with consequent heat issues.
As far as starting new threads go, go for it. Unless
your problem is clearly and obviously addressed by
another thread its actually a very good idea to start
a new one for your own particular problem. Otherwise
things can get very confused when posters are trying
to help out more than one problem sufferer. Often
what LOOKS like the same issue to the original poster
may turn out to involve something quite different,
and its easy to get lost in the ensuing confusions.
Cheers
Rod
Thanks. The MacBook was closed, so I can only assume the display was asleep. I'll bet you're right, though, and we just closed the lid before it finished shutting down. Since then I've been so paranoid, I've been waiting a good 20 seconds after the screen goes dark before closing the lid. I sure can't hear anything happening even with my ears right up to the vent.
And thanks for making me feel better about the new thread. Some forums get touchy about such things.
BTW, the only reason I'm formerly Don G. is because for some reason when I logged into my account, it made me go through the sign up page again, and said there was another user already with Don G. No kidding. That's me!

MBP - no display - solid sleep light... HELP

Hi all -
Brand new holiday Mac user here... i've searched, yet can't get the specifics i'm in search of...
I just cracked the seal on my new Mac Book Pro 20 minutes ago... after initial set up, I got the message to download the new EFI update... after funning update, i then shut down as instructed... now, NOTHING... my Mac Book won't come back on...
Can anyone help me here... i'm losing my mind wondering what's goin on with my new $2000 toy, before I've had a chance to enjoy it...
i've tried all the various resets and battery pulls... nothing is working - light just glowing at me...
thx a million and Happy New Year -

You need to use the Firmware Restoration CD:
http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/firmwarerestorationcd12.html
You'll need another computer to burn the CD on, then follow the instructions in the article to the letter. After that your MBP should be fine.

Sleep light doesn't' blink...is this normal???

I very curious/concerned about my UBMBP 17 sleep light. It doesn't blink when sleeping. The light stays solid white when my notebook is sleeping. But funny it does blinks when I manually put it to sleep...
is this normal?
Thanks!!!

Thanks everybody!
But Clay that's what I thought too that the HD isn't sleeping...but it finally did sleep and blink!
I tested it by changing to the shortest timer allowing it sleep/diplay in one minute aswell...but in reality it really took about several minutes after for it to blink....
On my UMBP 15" it doesn't do that.
nothing is connected and both are connected to power outlet with the lid open on both notebooks. Only program
running is safari and HD is checked rest when possible.
Message was edited by: KORG__
Message was edited by: KORG__

Sleep light stays on

One of my clients has a 1.8GHz G5 iMac and when it goes to sleep, the sleep light on the front of the computer stays solid - no pulsing. It did not do this originally. The machine is powered on 24/7 as is connected to server. Any ideas please. Many thanks.
Paul.

Hi Macbeard-
Is it possible that the display is set to go to sleep before the computer? If so, the display going dark will not cause the light to pulse. The light pulsing indicates that the entire machine is sleeping.
Luck-
-DP

New Hardrive and now blank screen with sleep light on

My warranty ran out on one of my mbp's, so I decided to install a new hardrive in one. I went through all the steps, and was very cautious. Now when I turn on the laptop the screen is blank and the sleep light stays on the entire time. I hear the cd-rom do some stuff but that's it. If anyone can help me figure out what happened it would be greatly appreciated.

Well problem solved, had to apply some pressure on top of the case by the left i/o and next thing you know I hear the beautiful chime

TS1365 I have a mac pro that when i turn it on the sleep light blinks and makes a beeping sound but my screen is black. Any idea's as to why this is happening and how do i fix it?

I have a mac pro that when i turn it on i get a black screen and the "sleep light" is on but i also get a beeping sound. How do i fix this? I have powered off turned it back on and tried the command, option, P, and R and still nothing

Welcome to the Apple Support Communities
How many beeps do you hear?

HT4600 i Get a solid amber light sometimes, bUT all works fine. I have to unplug the airport extreme to reset it and then it turns green and starys that way for a week or so and then turns back to amber. why is this and how do i fix it ?

I gat a solid amber light once a week on my airport extreme, but all works fine. I have to unplug it to reset it and then the light turns back to green and it is good for another week and then it happens again. why is this and what can i do to fix it ?

Solid amber on an AirPort Extreme is an indication that the internal power supply is starting to act up.
If the AirPort Extreme is in warranty, it shouid be exchanged for another AirPort Extreme.
If the AirPort Extreme is several years old, keep any eye on things. When/if you find that you are having to reset the device several times a week, it's time to start thinking about a replacement device, as the end is near.

Win 8.1 - solid HDD light on a W530 when the optical drive is closed

Hello,
I have a new W530 with Windows 8.1 on and a short time after boot or resume from standby, the HDD light will illuminate solidly (not flickering at all) with no disk activity to speak of showing in task manager.
I have tried the usual steps of disabling superfetch, search indexing, av, etc. and nothing helps. The only thing that does influence the light is whether the optical drive is closed or not. With the drive open, the light behaves normally and reflects the peaks of activity shown in task manager. The light going solid coincides with Windows turning off the Optical drive after start up when Zero Power ODD is enabled (the light still goes solid after a few seconds with Zero Power ODD disabled so may be related to some energy saving mode?).
This behaivour is not exhibited in Windows 8, Ubuntu 14.04, FreeDOS or the Bios so does seem to be an oddity of 8.1 on the W530. There appears to be no impact on performance of the system so it is more of an annoyance.
I am wondering if anyone else has come across this and/or has any suggestions as I don't fancy siutting with my optical drive open all the time...
Relevant specs are below:
Intel i7-3740QM
8GB RAM
250GB Samsung 840 EVO mSATA SSD (OS drive & boot drive, hardware/eDrive encrypted with Bitlocker)
500GB Hitachi Travelstar 7200RPM HDD
Nvidia Quadro K1000M 2GB (running in Optimus with Intel HD Graphics)
The laptop is configured with a static 1GB page file on the SSD and a static 36GB page file on the HDD.
Solved!
Go to Solution.

Ok, a bit of progress... For some reason, The SATA controller had been set to Compatability in the Bios rather than AHCI. Doing a fresh build with AHCI enabled did not exhibit the solid light when the Lenovo Settings Dependency Package was installed
Restoring my system image and then going through the process of enabling AHCI after a windows 8.1 install has solved the issue.
So, lesson learned - AHCI is needed in this config unless a solid HDD light is wanted. Obviously this is a bug, what is the best way to report it to Lenovo officially?

HT3964 My MacBook Pro will not boot up. The screen remains dark although the the comput makes the characteristic start up sound. The sleep light is showing.

MY MacBook Pro will not boot upThe screen is dark, but the sleep light is on and it makes the characteristic start up sound.What is wrong?

There is always the forum for MBP
MacBook Pro
https://discussions.apple.com/community/notebooks/macbook_pro
https://discussions.apple.com/community/mac_os?view=discussions
http://www.apple.com/support/macbookpro

TC solid AMBER LIGHT then dies. Apple won't help.

Over the weekend my time capsule powered off. When I tried to restart it, it went to a solid amber light for 15-30 seconds, and then died.
I unplugged it for half an hour, same problem, unplugged it overnight, same problem.
Soft reset won't work, hard reset won't work. Can't access it with ethernet.
Tried factory reset many times, solid amber light starts to blink, then when I release reset button (having held it for various amount of time) it goes solid amber, for a split second it sounds like it might start, then dies. No light. D E A D.
So, I've researched it online, and it seems a little different to the heat / power issue. I call Apple support, and the first tech just tries to order me a new one. My serial number 819 however prevents this. So a senior advisor comes on to tell me it can't be replaced. He get's cut off....
So I call back, and the tech reads the notes and basically tells me there is nothing that can be done, and is quite blasé about the whole thing. He offers me no advice and makes no attempt to diagnose the problem, just tells me it's done and I need to buy a new one as I don't have applecare.
I point out (nicely) it's only two years old, I expected more, it's supposed to be server grade, etc.
He replies "It's only a hard drive" which I found very interesting. ONLY A HARD DRIVE? So why did I pay $340 for it? He also tells me I should have backed up my back ups. So how many "server grade" back ups do I need to make? I need to buy 5 time capsules to back up my macbook incase 4 of them just give up suddenly? He also says that it's an electronic device and electronic devices fail. Just like that. May as well have just said "Tough luck, buddy!"
Later he tries to retract that statement and puts me through to another senior advisor. Predictably she tells me the same thing. No offer of repair or attempts to diagnose problem, just it's finished. She was as nice as she could be about it, but that's the conclusion. Eventually after I explained I was disappointed with this attitude, she said maybe I could take it to the genius bar to have the information taken off and moved to a new TC.
So basically, my new drive will be costing me in the region of $700 (given that my original $340 TC is only good for the trash).
My current thinking is I shall try and retrieve the data myself, use one of my other much, much cheaper external HD's that have been running flawlessly for years as a back up, and wait to see if Apple start to issue replacements for my serial number.
Ultimately I don't want a free replacement TC, I'd rather mine worked. I was expecting a better service, at least an attempt to make me feel like this was out of the ordinary, or they were concerned about me buying more Apple products in the future.... I was also expecting a server grade HD to last more than two years.....
Anyway, stepping off my soap box..... If anyone has any suggestions how I can get this going, or what the cause might be please before I try and retrieve the data myself.
Thanks!

I had the same problem while doing a backup. My Capsule is a 2008 model, but an "818" in the serial number so it's not part of the recall.
THIS IS HOW I RETREIVED MY DATA FROM MY DEAD TIME CAPSULE:
Put time capsule in Zip-lock freezer bag and suck all the air out of the bag using a straw.
Put time capsule into deep freezer for a few hours. (the zip lock is to stop/reduce humidity on the electronics inside the capsule)
Remove from freezer, cross your fingers and plug it in.
On mine, after the solid yellow light went out, there was loud fans and lots of noise. Let it boot for a couple minutes and either connect to it wireless/ethernet and start transferring your data. Depending on how cold your freezer is (deep freeze is usually -18C/0F and house freezer is -9C/15F) will probably depend on how long the TC is up and running. Mine ran for 45min straight, then i was done transferring and left it to see if it was fully operational again. Checked back on it an hour later and the drive had stopped and the light was off...
You could even try to run it from inside the freezer as well...
GOOD LUCK!!

Mac OS 10.4.3 and Sleep Light Update

So, after installing Mac OS 10.4.3 update through Software Update on my Rev. A iMac G5 I have experienced the same "fans at full blast" issue that others have reported on reboot. However, the fans went back to normal speed after the system loaded the Finder.
I now just noticed that the sleep light is very bright during the night time hours so I am guessing that this update removes the infamous and troublesome (for many) sleep light firmware update. Can anyone else confirm this?

Finally I find how to reset CORRECTLY the SMU and resolve the problem about the sleep light!
Pay attention, because to reset the SMU in iMac rev A - the first generation - like mine (dec. 2004) must open the backside of Mac and following the instruction like here: http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=301283
at the point 11.
In a few words, disconnect all the plugs, open the back, reconnect the power cord, (in the center a little green led is on) ....
Press the SMU reset button (the small, metal button next to the internal power button, shown below) to reset system and power management.
Its work. wow
take care ;))

TS1365 My Macbook Pro 17" 2.44ghz all of a sudden one day decided to not boot up. When the power button is pressed the sleep light in the front on the latch release turns on and there is a small running sound but it never boots up and the screen never lig

My Macbook Pro 17" 2.44ghz all of a sudden one day decided to not boot up. When the power button is pressed the sleep light in the front on the latch release turns on and there is a small running sound but it never boots up and the screen never lights up. Anyone else have this problem? Any ideas?
I'd love to repair it but not if it'll cost 500 bucks or more to replace the logicboard.
I appreciate any help
Michael

Lao Bo,
yes, you can locate and copy a file from your HD to a USB key using UNIX commands. If you know the exact name of the file which you’re trying to locate, try this:
find / -iname filename -print
This command will search your entire internal disk for the particular filename. If you know that it’s within a particular user account, then you can save search time with this variation:
find /Users/username -iname filename -print
Either variation of this command will print all files found which have the given filename. Presuming that you’re able to identify the correct file, you can copy it to a USB key using the command
cp -p filename_returned_by_find /Volumes/USB_volume
If you’re not sure which volume name your USB key has, this command will show you what the possibilities are:
ls /Volumes
Please let me know if you have any trouble with these commands.

Sleep light flashes 5 times - no beeps. What does it mean?

I have a white 2008 Macbook 2.4 Ghz. I recently installed 10.6 from scratch via Retail DVD and the Macbook worked fine. I updated via Software Update and installed all the updates that appeared. There was also a Firmware update to install, which I did after the update to 10.6.8.
But since then, the Macbook has serious video problems.
It boots okay, but the sequence is now:
- front sleep light flashes 5 times; there are no error beeps
- I hear the startup chime
- the Apple logo and spinning wheel appear, and bootup continues
- at the point where the screen goes blue, and would normally boot to the desktop, the screen now goes black and the Macbook appears to go to sleep
If I wait for a couple of minutes, when I press a key to wake the Macbook from sleep: the DVD spins up, the sleep light flashes 5 times, and I now see the desktop. But then the screen goes black after about 10 seconds.
Before the screen goes black, I can see that the boot seems to have completed okay. I have a Wifi connection and the date and time are correct.
If I go really fast, I can move the arrow to the Apple icon in the top bar and choose Shut down or Restart.
I can boot from the internal HD, an external FW HD and an Install DVD.
I can hold down the Option key and I get all the bootable volumes to boot from. I can choose any of them, then start the boot process, but at the same point - the blue screen - the screen goes black and the Macbook goes to sleep.
The Macbook works perfectly fine when connected to an external monitor. In the Display preferences, only the external monitor is available. The Macbook monitor is not listed. As well, iSight and Photo Booth report that no camera is connected.
I've found some info on the Apple site re. the 5 sleep light flashes, but it only refers to the Macbook Air, and indicates a problem with the battery.
Has anyone seen this problem with the Macbook?

From EZ Jim's link, there was another link to this info at the Apple site, re. Power on Self-Tests:
The power on self-test resides in the ROM of the computer. This test runs whenever the computer is turned on after being fully shut down (the power-on self-test does not run if the computer is only restarted).
If a fault is detected during the test, you will not hear a normal startup chime. Instead, the system will beep as explained below. If you experience one of these beeps, you may call your Apple Authorized Service Provider for additional troubleshooting assistance.
1 beep = no RAM installed
2 beeps = incompatible RAM types
3 beeps = no good banks
4 beeps = no good boot images in the boot ROM (and/or bad sys config block)
5 beeps = processor is not usable
In addition to the beeps, on some computers the power LED will flash a corresponding number of times plus one. The LED will repeat the sequence after approximately a 5-second pause. The tones are only played once.
As I wrote, I don't get the Error Beeps. I've had these on other Macs, so I know what they are. Here, I only get the LED flashes.
What is interesting above is that they say that the Power LED will flash a corresponding number of times (as the beeps) PLUS ONE. In my case, then, if I got 5 flashes, then might it mean NO GOOD BOOT IMAGES IN THE BOOT ROM?
Anyway, it doesn't seem to have the flashing LED problem any more. No idea where to go from here.

My macbook isn't powering up and makes a beeping noise in time with the sleep light

Hi There I hope someone can help!!!
I had disconnected the power cable and left the MacBook in sleep mode with the lid shut. When I now go to open my MacBook up, and wait for my system to resume from where I left off the screen doesn't on and the sleep light goes off. when I close the lid the sleep light goes back on as if it is in sleep mode but the same happens when I open it again, no power to the screen.
I order to try get my MacBook working again I tried holding down the power button and switching it back on again but the MacBook now looks as if it is going to power up but the sleep light comes on for about 3 secs and then beeps, then every 4-5 secs constantly the MacBook beeps once in time with the sleep light (to note the sleep light is not following its usual fade on fade off rhythm).
I have tried resetting the SMC using the shift command control option and power button (also this is the only way to stop the beeping and flashing) and when you try and switch on the MacBook if you just press the power button it just follows the same beep with sleep light routine, but if you hold the power button in then the sleep light then flashes quickly about 4-6 times and then starts to beep in time with the flash again.
I will also add I have not reconfigured anything or added any RAM to my MacBook it is still on the standard (manufacturing) configuration as I have been looking about for anyone with similar issues and the main question back seems to be have you changed the RAM, I have also tried resetting teh RAM and the proble still persists.
If someone can help it would be awesome!

Here's the Apple support article on beeps https://support.apple.com/kb/HT1547

Solid Sleep Light

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