Mac Mini, Late 2012 2.5 GHz i5, 820-3227-A Power Problem, Shuts Down

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Mac mini Late 2012

Released on October 23, 2012. Core i5 or Core i7 Processor. Apple Fusion Drive.

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kamilerdmanski @kamilerdmanski

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Posted: Dec 21, 2016

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Mac Mini, Late 2012 2.5 GHz i5, 820-3227-A Power Problem, Shuts Down

I have the following problem with an Apple Mac Mini (late 2012) 2.5 GHz i5, 4GB 240GB SSD.

Logic board: 820-3227-A

The Mac boots normally and you hear the start sound (chime). The HDMI output works and displays the screen correctly. Comprehensively the Mac functions problem-free.

After about 20-60 seconds, the Mac simply shuts down and does not go on back.

If I wait a few minutes to remove the SMC (3V) battery from the Mac and reinstall it into the Mac, the Mac will work again. After 20-60 seconds, he goes out again.

I have no circuit diagram or boardview, so I can measure nothing.

What I've tried:

- the Mac without component started (without SSD hard disk) - no success

- RAM memory changed - no success

- Power supply replaced - no success

- The Logicboard reheated - no success

Can the SMC IC (tempreture sensor) be the cause of this problem? Unfortunately, I still have to wait a few days for the IC chip to arrive. Can I test it in a different way?

About help I would be very grateful.

Answer this question I have this problem too

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2 Answers

Dan @danj Rep: 478.9k Self employed contract worker 35 329 970 · Answer 1 · 2016-12-21T16:58:16-07:00

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Dan @danj

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Posted: Dec 21, 2016

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Before you do anything more. Can you give us some background on what happened.

Your system is going in to fail safe. Did you pull off the heat sink?

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The system suddenly goes down. The fan no longer spins and no sound is heard. The mac is suddenly completely dead. I don't pull the heat sink off. I renewed only THe termal paste once.

Dec 22, 2016 by kamilerdmanski

Either the power supply needs replacing or in the process of redoing the thermal paste you didn't apply it correctly or damaged something in the process.

Dec 22, 2016 by Dan

You can't add anything more on what the symptoms where before it failed. Often something leads up to a hard failure like this. Did you have a lightning storm or power disruption? Do you have your system plugged into a good surge suppressor or UPS?

Dec 22, 2016 by Dan

These symptoms suddenly start to shake. The Mac has just gone down.

Before that, it worked quite normally. No graphics problems or other abnormalities.

In addition, the Mac has also gone down 20 seconds before the thermal paste is replaced.

The power supply has already been replaced. This has not been a success. I had always connected the Mac to a normal socket.

Dec 23, 2016 by kamilerdmanski

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Leslie Derby @slowhuck Rep: 1 3 · Answer 2 · 2017-10-26T18:11:13-07:00

Did you ever get resolution to this? I am in a similar situation.

About a month ago my mid-2011 i5 Mac Mini started performing uncommanded restarts. Specs: 16gb RAM, original 500gb HDD in the primary position (thermal sensor intact), 500gb SSD in the secondary bay. At first the restart frequency was every 30 minutes to an hour. In time, the frequency increased - but I could get it to stay up for extended periods by running certain apps in the foreground.

Eventually it got to the point that the frequency of restarts were so great that it became unusable. And finally, it would not even finish booting.

In an effort to solve the issue, I:

1. replaced the fan. (it was getting noisy and obviously failing)

2. Replaced the power supply. (thinking the failing fan had over stressed and damaged it)

3. tested individual RAM sticks by inserted them, one at a time, into different banks.

4. Pulled the fan and shroud to access the drive connectors. Disconnected the SSD. No Joy.

5. Reconnected the SSD, disconnected the HDD.

Aha! It booted immediately!

Thinking I had identified the old 'original' HDD as the villain in my scenario, left it disconnected. Reinstalled the shroud, fan and bottom cover. Re-plugged my connectors, mouse and keyboard - fully expecting to be delivered from my discomfort.

Hit the power button and smiled as I watched the boot status bar scoot up to about 80%. Then... uncommanded restart! About one in six times it would finish the boot process and display the desktop, only to restart within 30 seconds.

So... I'm back to zero and my Mac Mini is a brick.