My New MacBook... Dead!

[VTeCMonKeY]

Hi guys,

I got my new macbook yesterday and had a great time learning all the bits and bobs (never had a mac before), thoroughly loved it and absolute joy to use!

anyway, as per the manual i decided to calibrate the battery last night, so early evening i disconnected it from AC (from where it had been running all day) and let it run down, i was surfing the tinternet in bed and when it was time to catch some z's i just put it on the floor (still open) and left it so that it would run out of juice and then go to sleep, and stay asleep until it would run out completely and power down.

this morning, all the lights on the mb are out as to be expected, then i walked into the study and plugged in the keyboard/mouse/external monitor/ac power and pressed (i think) a keyboard key and it switched on and displayed how i left it last night on the external monitor.

i then had a shower and upon returning to the study, the macbook was off - the little led on the ac connector was flickering between weak and stong versions of amber and green (couldn't seem to make its mind up) and eventually settle on green (so straight away there is a problem, just 10 minutes earlier is was fully discharged and now it was reporting fully charged!), so i try to switch on, and i got nothing... left it a bit longer, then i got an apple logo and the cd whirring a bit, then it powered down again

this is where i'm at now, i've tried:

• reseating the battery

• resetting the SMC

• putting in disc 1 of the mac os x install discs on one of the occasions that it switched on for a short time - it did actually stay on a bit longer while it thought about what was on this disc... then died...

• switching on while holding cmd-opt-o-f - nothing happened

all in all - i'm gutted!

just been on the phone to apple who are sending me a replacement next week, but the point of this tread was to ask some questions:

• did i do something wrong in the calibration? seems like a bloody risky business to me if this can happen - wont be doing it with my next one even if it means i have to have a lesser battery life span.

• how can i get the mac os x cd out? when i can get it to switch on it stays on for maybe 10 seconds and in that time no amount of pressing the eject button gives me back the cd...

• if anyone knows a way to get this thing on i would greatly appreciate it, i have company accounts on it in a folder that i really need to stay confidential, dont want it going back to apple with my stuff on if i can avoid it.

all in all, very disappointed that something like this can happen because of something the apple manual told me to do.

 

[Cybergypsy]

Has never happened to me???????????????????

 

[thewhitehart]

It seems to be a lemon, like mine was. I don't think it has anything to do with you calibrating the battery.

When it doesn't seem that the macbook is on, take a good look at the screen in bright light. I thought mine wasn't on, turns out I had hardware failure resulting in the backlight not coming on, except on random and few restarts.

There seems to be a plethora of problems involving shutdown and sleep with new Santa Rosa macbooks in the Apple Macbook discussion threads.

They replaced mine. In fact, before 10:30 am here in New York, it should be arriving at my doorstep. Hopefully it won't exhibit the same problems.

I'm glad they're sending you a replacement. Resetting the SMC was the last resort for me too.

To get the CD out, try holding down the mouse button while restarting.

 

[edesignuk]

Quite simply, take it back and get a replacement.

 

[Animalk]

Be careful, I thought the same thing when i first calibrated my MBP on the day i got it.

If the battery is too low, the computer will not turn on, even if its plugged, until it has recharged a certain amount. Apple has documented this on their support site I believe. Just let it sit charging for a while and see what happens.

 

[VTeCMonKeY]

Be careful, I thought the same thing when i first calibrated my MBP on the day i got it.

If the battery is too low, the computer will not turn on, even if its plugged, until it has recharged a certain amount. Apple has documented this on their support site I believe. Just let it sit charging for a while and see what happens.

I did think of that, thought maybe even though it was running from AC that it might need some initial battery juice kinda like a lot of mobile phones...

but the laptop has been plugged in all day out of stubbornness so i'm thinking it really is cabbaged...

as a solution to my problem that there is confidential info on the mb, i have decided to take out the hdd... i'm not sure what apple are going to say but i'm just not willing to hand it over, there is something on it from a client for which i had to sign a non-disclosure agreement and i just can't have it going to any tom, dick or harry who works at apple repair.

at the end of the day i didn't ask for this to happen, and i'm the one being put out so hopefully they wont mind about a £40 hdd...

wise move? maybe not, what do you think?