2009 white MacBook not charging

[jem.graham]

Hello all, just bought a 2009 macbook a1181 off eBay, came today and had it on for a few minutes trying to get into recovery to reset the OS. First time I tried the charging cable fell out and the laptop turned off due to the battery being very very old. Reconnected power, turned it on, booted into recovery again. Set the laptop down so there was no chance of the cable falling out. Loading into the recovery and the laptop turned off and the green charging indicator turned off.

Can't get the charger light to come on anymore so I'd assume the charger is knackered but wonder if there is a chance there could be any other damage to the rest of the system?

Cheers all

[Kilrah]

Yep, lots of possibilities for the internals to cause no charger light.

[emosun]

with a charger and battery that old plus the machine most likely having the means to prevent the system from charging in the event of a weird charging state (like being 10 years old) then yeah that'll be a tough one to solve without a new battery and charger

[jem.graham]

6 minutes ago, Kilrah said:

Yep, lots of possibilities for the internals to cause no charger light.

Yeah, know the battery is crap so not sure whether its just not charging or the system is dead

[jem.graham]

6 minutes ago, emosun said:

with a charger and battery that old plus the machine most likely having the means to prevent the system from charging in the event of a weird charging state (like being 10 years old) then yeah that'll be a tough one to solve without a new battery and charger

Will start with a new charger I think. Wondering if there is anyway to see whether the green light will come on the charger without plugging it in like shorting it out with paperclip or something

[emosun]

1 minute ago, jem.graham said:

Will start with a new charger I think. Wondering if there is anyway to see whether the green light will come on the charger without plugging it in like shorting it out with paperclip or something

the chances the led died is slim , it's more likely the computer itself detect a strange charge state and locked itself down , or the charger detected it and locked itself down , or the charger just died.

You're gonna be in a real minefield of issues as far as getting a 10 year old mac laptop to work again. Not a lot of apple diagnostic people here that know that specific model so i wish you luck

[jem.graham]

2 minutes ago, emosun said:

the chances the led died is slim , it's more likely the computer itself detect a strange charge state and locked itself down , or the charger detected it and locked itself down , or the charger just died.

You're gonna be in a real minefield of issues as far as getting a 10 year old mac laptop to work again. Not a lot of apple diagnostic people here that know that specific model so i wish you luck

Ah well I'll guess I'll just hope for the best haha. Sucks I just got the thing too

[Kilrah]

12 minutes ago, jem.graham said:

Wondering if there is anyway to see whether the green light will come on the charger without plugging it in like shorting it out with paperclip or something

No there isn't, the charger and mac have a communication line going between them and the LED will only turn on if both work and successfully talk together.

The charger also doesn't output any power until the mac has told it to.

[jem.graham]

7 minutes ago, Kilrah said:

No there isn't, the charger and mac have a communication line going between them and the LED will only turn on if both work and successfully talk together.

The charger also doesn't output any power until the mac has told it to.

Right got you, thanks for that

[Vishera]

Old batteries are known to have issues charging and holding charge.

[Kilrah]

Note that the green light is unrelated to the battery, it will come on even if there is no battery present.

So it's either a faulty charger, or an actual hardware problem in the mac.