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Battery good, but will not charge.

I have two of these laptops, one is used simply to charge the battery but doesn't work otherwise, and the other is fully functional, save it will not charge the battery. When plugged in the battery does not deplete, but simply won't charge.

Doing some research I have reset the PMU and checked the PRAM to see if that battery was dead, but it appears to be fine according to the guide on the mac website.

It appears also that the PMU which I am guessing is responsible for charging (?) is part of the motherboard and not substitutable from one machine to the other.

I know very little about computers however, and I wonder if anyone with a more comprehensive understanding of how these machines work might offer any help or opinion as to whether this problem is feasibly operable or whether I should just continue as I have been and be glad that I have another PB to use as a charging unit - allowing me a semi-portable machine.

Thanks in advance,

Martin

Answered! View the answer I have this problem too

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Could be your charger, or DC-in board. System Profiler->Power will tell you if the computer detects the charger, and if it's charging the battery. It will also give you the battery status (number of cycles and if it's circuitry is reporting problems).

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The computer detects that the charger is connected , but it also is aware that it is not charging the battery. It doesn't draw power from the battery when plugged in, but as soon as the cord is unplugged it begins to draw power from the battery (as is the case with fully functioning machines as well)

Does the DC-in board deal with anything more complex than the hardware connection itself? It seems like it would make sense to have the charging and power unit separate from the main logic board, but I cant figure out conclusively whether this is how mac goes about things, I get the feeling that it isn't. Any thoughts are greatly appreciated.

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Try downloading and running Coconut battery and let us know your results. You stated "When plugged in the battery does not deplete, but simply won't charge." Do you mean the machine will not even draw power from the battery?

http://www.coconut-flavour.com/

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The computer detects that the charger is connected , but it also is aware that it is not charging the battery. It doesn't draw power from the battery when plugged in, but as soon as the cord is unplugged it begins to draw power from the battery (as is the case with fully functioning machines as well).

The results from Coconut battery are as follows:

Current Battery Charge: 1739 mAh

Maximum Battery Charge: 4016mAh

(43%)

Current Battery Capacity: 4016 mAh

Original Battery Capacity: 4400mAh

(91%)

Battery-Loadcycles: 55

Age of Your Mac: 81 months

Charger Connected: Yes

Battery is Charging: No

Thanks for your interest and diagnostic attempts,

I wonder if this elucidates things at all?

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I've seen the battery connector fail several times. I would replace this part first: [linked product missing or disabled: IF154-067]

It's a moderate difficulty fix, here's how to do it: PowerBook G4 Aluminum 15" 1.67 GHz Battery Connector Replacement

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Thanks I'll give it a try, I suppose that the connectors that use the power from the battery may be working but the pins that connect it to the charging unit may be dead.

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My battery is 0 percent .its not charging. Battery condition is showing good. Mac laptop goes off when unplugged.

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