03-17-2005, 01:08 AM

All I hear is how relaible and stable macs are compared to PCs. I am in college and do a lot of work w/ Photoshop, dreamweaver, flash, and quark so I sold my IBM thinkpad and got a used powerbook G4 DVI 667 w/ 512 MB RAM on ebay. I have a home-built PC running a 3.4 GHz Pentium 4 w/ 1 GB RAM. I noticed that the speed when using the mentioned applications is actually pretty similar (desktop vs. G4) and it blows my old thinkpad out of the water. The airport reception is amazing compared to the PCMCIA card I had on the thinkpad and overall I really like the G4. However, it has been crashing all the time. I reformatted and reinstalled OS X 10.3 and have gotten all of the updates. Before, I had a problem where every time I put in a blank CD, it would crash. That problem has been fixed w/ the reformat, but now, it is crashing about 25% of the time when going into or coming out of sleep mode. What could be causing this? I could count all of the times that my home built PC has crashed on one hand (AKA, less than five times). This G4 has crashed more in the first week. The powerbook I bought has applecare through August. Does anyone know anything about this? Was there a recall on this logic board or anything? Should I send it into applecare? Also, the screen has 3 dead pixels on it and a bunch of fading from the keyboard I am guessing. Does apple care cover any of this? Any and all input is welcome/appreciated. Thanks!

03-17-2005, 01:25 AM

Sounds like you got a bad logic board and got screwed by the eBay seller. Definitely have it checked by apple.

AppleCare requires a minimum of 6 (or maybe it is 7) dead pixels and would not cover the fading from the keyboard pressing against the screen (I suggest a keyboard cover from www.marware.com)

03-17-2005, 01:31 AM

Originally Posted by trpnmonkey41

Sounds like you got a bad logic board and got screwed by the eBay seller. Definitely have it checked by apple.

AppleCare requires a minimum of 6 (or maybe it is 7) dead pixels and would not cover the fading from the keyboard pressing against the screen (I suggest a keyboard cover from www.marware.com)

But, if it is a bad logic board, wouldn't it certainly be covered by applecare?

03-17-2005, 01:32 AM

if there is a logic board problem and you have applecare they will definitely take care of it... i just don't know if that entails an entire new powerbook or just replacing the logic board and sending you back your laptop, I don't know because I have not had any issues with my powerbook of iMac

03-17-2005, 01:37 AM

is there any chance that it could be a hard drive problem? the HD seems to be in good shape. it sounds fine and is responsive. Also, the crashes are usually just a frozen screen, but sometimes DOS-like characters come across the screen on top of whatever is there. Wierd. Thanks for your help by the way.

03-17-2005, 01:39 AM

Frozen screen and DOS-like characters definitely makes me believe it is a logic board issue. Have you gotten a screen that pops up that says you have to restart the computer in 5 languages?

03-17-2005, 01:46 AM

no, never got that. It's only done the dos characters 2 or three times but it's frozen up probably 5 other times. And it's not when i'm doing intense stuff. Usually in and out of sleep.

03-17-2005, 01:53 AM

Hard Drive problems are usually noticed by a clicking/clanking noise of the hard drive and errors booting where it can not find the OS sometimes but what your problems I would definitely characterize as logic board problems from what you have said. AppleCare will definitely take care of those issues. I would go to an Apple store near you with the laptop because they tend to be much kinder in person when it comes to taking care of the issues. Definitely bring up the dead pixels and other screen problems. Tell them that this is ridiculous and I wouldn't be surprised if they put in a work order form to replace screen/chassis and logic board if they deem that to be the problem.

03-17-2005, 02:47 PM

It's near impossible to get a new replacement computer from Apple (especially for a logib board problem) my 7month old PB is on it's 3rd logic board...

03-17-2005, 03:30 PM

I had the same problem with mine, coming out of sleep it would freeze or just go black or not wake at all the latch button would stop pulsing but the screen would stay black. I set my powerbook to require a pasword to wake from sleep and screensaver an have not had the problem since then.

03-17-2005, 03:38 PM

Originally Posted by SamR

It's near impossible to get a new replacement computer from Apple (especially for a logib board problem) my 7month old PB is on it's 3rd logic board...

You are aware that there is Federal and in some cases State law covering this? Specifically the federal Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act. Lemon laws in most states cover only vehicles, but there are exceptions. Of particular interest in your case is 15 U.S.C. 2304(a)(4). It runs the risk of pissing Apple off but the reality is that there are laws specifically written to protect the consumer from the need for an unreasonable number of repairs upon an item.

For the original poster I think you effectively got shafted b someone selling a PB where they knew it was bad so they pawned it off before the warranty ended so that someone else could deal with it. See if you can get a repair history on the laptop from Apple.

03-17-2005, 07:21 PM

[QUOTE=Kokopelli]You are aware that there is Federal and in some cases State law covering this? Specifically the federal Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act. Lemon laws in most states cover only vehicles, but there are exceptions. Of particular interest in your case is 15 U.S.C. 2304(a)(4). It runs the risk of pissing Apple off but the reality is that there are laws specifically written to protect the consumer from the need for an unreasonable number of repairs upon an item.

I'm beginning to think that that may be true, but I still got a really good deal on it, so if I can get it taken care of, I'll be more than pleased. I counted the actual dead pixels on ( by getting a black background up and turning the lights in the room out) the screen and it is in excess of 10. So I'm going to take it into the apple store next week because the warranty should be transferred by then. Thanks to everyone for their input. More suggestions are welcome but I'll definetely post and let everyone know what happens.

03-17-2005, 10:33 PM

I ahve a question.

I'm new to the mac, but what exactly is the logicboard?

03-17-2005, 10:52 PM

Originally Posted by iphix

I ahve a question.

I'm new to the mac, but what exactly is the logicboard?

The motherboard. Except, on Macs most of the stuff is soldered directly onto the board itself to prevent upgrading (like video cards, for example.)

03-18-2005, 09:59 AM

Originally Posted by meltbanana314

The motherboard. Except, on Macs most of the stuff is soldered directly onto the board itself to prevent upgrading (like video cards, for example.)

I don't think Apple did that to prevent upgrades. It maybe more to make the board more compact.