Hi, my mid-2013 MacBook Air wouldn't start. Took it to apple Genius Bar, they said the logic board needed replacing and it would cost £360. I unscrewed the back to have a look myself. It looks like this one particular part has burnt out. Can anyone help with identifying this part and also what might have happened to it?
Relevant part is at the very top, in the middle, just above the QR code.
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I think you had a spider make a home in your system! The area of the damage compared with this one: Logic board does not have any component present. So I think this is the spiders nest as the spider silk is present on the Airport card and the antenna leads.
Hopefully all you'll need to do here is clean up the junk and things will work again. Get some isopropyl alcohol (85% or better) and cotton swabs (Q-Tips) then carefully disconnect the battery following this IFIXIT guide: MacBook Air 13" Mid 2013 Battery Replacement follow it to Step3 then clean things up. Let us know if that did it. If not post another image of just the area.
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Or possibly animal hair, depending on how fine it is in real life. Jessica, do you have a cat? In any case, dan and oldturkey03 are both theorizing a short in the electrical path, with the fibers bridging the contact points. As for the Genius Bar: They're in the replacement business, not the repair business. They've got thousands of outlets; if they train people to replace components until the device works again, that's more repeatable than teaching people to figure out why the component failed in the first place. All their fixit procedures conclude with "replace the logic board", so that's what they tell you when the real answer is "we don't know what's wrong, but it might be everything up to/including **this**, so we're giving you the worst-case scenario". In the US, Apple Stores have started doing selective component replacements at central repair depots in California and Texas; the price is about US$350 to replace everything that's busted, lower prices for less replacement.
The area is very localized so I don't think its from a spill but instead insect damage. I've seen this before when a spider makes a nest. The wetness created by the nest creates this whitish splotch. This splotch then shorts things out which I think is whats happening here.
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That looks like corrosion from liquid damage... Has it gotten wet? Try this guide:
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Jessica Rae sorry I do not see the corrosion on this board. If corroded I would expect to see evidence of this on the IC right next to it as well. The "part" that I assume you are inquiring about, should actually have been omitted. That is R5116 which is a 0ohm 1/10W 5% resistor in a 603 package and is used for debug power on only. It is not present in normal operation. Those are actually the equivalent of your "Power-On" pads and should only show two square solder pads.
. Clean those with a soldering iron and repost an image close enough to the area in question. Check the components around the power buttons as well as the trackpad ribbon connector.
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@oldturkey03 - We're on the same wavelength ;-}
@danj sure looks like it. Again, I don not see any evidence of corrosion. Not sure if you do. If it is a problem, than it is somewhere in the smc onoff circuit.
Do not clean your logic board with a soldering iron. If it looks corroded just use some alcohol on a qtip and if u can't get the corrosion off that way disconnect the battery plug and use a tooth brush with a tiny bit of alcohol on it. That chip is part of the logic board so the only way to fix it if it is burned out would be to change the board it looks like. I have my board out of my Mac air right now. I'll look at it n see if it's the same n get back to u.
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