Power down
by Volker Weber
I told you this before and I am doing it again: Plan for extended maintenance.
Today Snoopy's power supply went dark. The plug is still lit as if it were charging the battery, but the indicator in Mac OS tells me it is not. The power supply is also cold, while it used to be quite hot when charging. I called AppleCare, spent almost 30 minutes in their 12ct a minute hotline until I had this case sorted out. A new power supply is in the mail and I have to turn the old one in. Unless I want my credit card charged. I am lucky to have a spare charger (plus one for the car) otherwise I would run out of power soon.
Also note that Apple discontinued the 45W power supply that came with the iBook. I am getting a 65W replacement. My guess is that they are all dying. Make sure you get a replacement before your warranty runs out. I hope you don't need instructions. ;-)
Comments
In case of 12ct/min hotlines Das 0180-Telefonbuch can be very handy.
Volker, re-read the label on the box your Apple hardware was delivered in: it reads "Designed by Apple in California". No word about engineering, tho ;-)
The charger plug is a gold plated 3.5mm "Headphone Jack", which has to conduct 65 watts of power at 18 volts, which is a bit more than 3.5 ampere of current that is flowing through a pair of contact areas smaller than 0.2 square millimeters. On my PB15/FW800 not only the power supply but also the plug get burning hot.
As I said: design vs. engineering…
Regards,
/k
