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| Powerbook 180 sudden death | |
| Posted by: CosmicArchivist on 2022-12-28 07:51:36 For quite some time now I've had a Macintosh Powerbook 180 that has worked pretty much perfectly, spare a malfunctioning floppy drive and a long-since removed PSRAM expansion card - I'd been using it more lately, and even typed up some short stories since I just found it nice to write on. However, just recently as I was using it, the machine froze, and attempting to reboot it yielded nothing but a blank, lined screen with no boot chime. I left it for a few minutes and tried pressing reset+interrupt before starting it back up, and doing this resulted in the same blank screen, this time with a boot chime, followed by a chime of death cut short by silence. Most of the time, it seems the hard disk only spins up if I press the reset button while it's booting. If anyone has any idea as to what could be wrong with it, I'd deeply appreciate the input.  | |
| Posted by: 3lectr1cPPC on 2022-12-28 08:01:03 First thing to check is the AC Adapter. If it’s an original, it’s likely just gone out of spec due to bad caps. If it’s an aftermarket one, the PowerBook’s interconnect board is the next thing I’d think would be at fault, the cable on them can go bad and cause weird behavior like this, but I don’t know if that could produce a death chime? Oh, and welcome to the forums! | |
| Posted by: CosmicArchivist on 2022-12-28 08:14:36 Thank you! Yes, the adapter is an original, and seeing as this unit lacks an internal battery (I'd actually been planning to improvise one soon) it's not out of the question that this could be what's wrong. It's been a long time since I last opened it, and I'll have to find another torx t8 screwdriver to get it open again, but as soon as I do I'll take a look at that. From what I've read, a fuse connected to the charging port could also be the culprit, and I'm meaning to check the connection on the display's ribbon cable as well. At any rate, I hope it's not anything much more serious than that. | |
| Posted by: 3lectr1cPPC on 2022-12-28 09:05:23 I’m 90% sure it’s the AC Adapter at this point. They are dropping like flies, the caps used ALWAYS leak. Good news is that aftermarket supplies are super cheap on Amazon and they work great. | |
| Posted by: AndyO on 2022-12-28 11:31:27 Probably not at all helpful, but when I got it, my 180 powered up to a black screen with (usually) 5 horizontal lines across it, each a pixel tall. It then froze. When I attempted to reset it, I'd get the chimes of death. Occasionally, it would actually start up, but not usually. It booted reliably once I removed the RAM card it had come with. Now, on power on, I get the same black screen with 5 white 1-pixel thick lines across, which after a couple of seconds then clears to grey with the mouse pointer, and it starts to boot. I think, the black screen with lines is while it is performing a power on self test, and boot up only begins when that completes successfully. If so, that might indicate something hardware-related preventing the POST from successfully completing - in my case when I got it, RAM. | |
| Posted by: CosmicArchivist on 2022-12-29 00:06:33 I find the exact same thing to be the case, and I also had the exact same experience re: malfunctioning RAM cards, as I briefly mentioned earlier. Of course, there unfortunately aren't any more RAM cards to remove at this point, so it's going be something else, but thank you for the little observation wrt the POST. On the note of replacement power bricks, what might I want to look for? Would I be able to find a generic adapter with the same input/output specs and connector, or does the PB1x0 use something more specialised that third parties have replicated? | |
| Posted by: AndyO on 2022-12-29 04:34:25 This https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07WT32GNK/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1 is the one I bought. Two in fact, and both work perfectly with my 100-series PBs. | |
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