MC721: built in "camera not connected"

Hi, any help appreciated.

I bought this MC721 on ebay, and everything appears to work for the past day. Today, my daughter pulled over all her photos and itunes from her 2009 macbook pro, mb985.

This evening, she noticed a few programs on the mb985 that were not on the mc721, like iPhoto, iMovie, and the Adobe CS4 program., and copied them over to her mc721... all was good until she was checking to see if the camera built into the display worked. She launched Facetime, and got a camera icon with a line through it.., So then she launched Photo Booth, and got the message: "There is no connected camera".

There is only one User on the mc721, that is, my daughter. She has the admin password.

I will call the repair shop that sold the computer tomorrow, but tonight I'd like to see if there is something that she can fix herself.

When she went into About this Mac,>more info,>System Report>hardware,>USB, she did not find the hardware called Built in isight like we find in our other two macbook pros. . Does that mean the isight camera is not working, or that software isn't installed? The mc721 just shows USB>USB Device Tree (shaded), then USB Hi-Speed Bus>Hub>IR Receiver. The place where it should say "Built-in iSight" is just blank -- or I should it doesn't say anything in the place where it says "Built-in iSight" on the MB985 and also the 2009 13" macbook pro we have.

One thing my daughter found in googling this problem is that she should try resetting the SMC... but she doesn't know what that is or how to do it.

Any suggestions?

Have her reset the System Management Controller. Refer to the following Apple KB article: LINK If that doesn't work, I would return it to the seller and ask for a refund.

chscag said:

Have her reset the System Management Controller. Refer to the following Apple KB article: LINK If that doesn't work, I would return it to the seller and ask for a refund.

Click to expand...

OK, so I looked at your link, and followed the instructions:

1) Turned off the computer, with the Magsafe adapter connected
2) Held down the Shift, Control, Option and Power buttons at the same time, for about five seconds, then released them all simultaneously.
3) Turned the computer on via the power button
4) Went into About this Mac, more Info, Hardware, USB, and still did not find Built-in iSight under the USB tab.

I wasn't sure I had really done the SMC reset, so I repeated it, and this time I was sure it did b/c the Magsafe connector changed from amber to green during the reset.

Same result. Clicking on Photo Booth again, I still get the message "There is no connected camera."

I'm beginning to think the camera built into this computer's monitor is broken.

One other thought I had. While googling this issue, one thread talked about migrating from Snow Leopard to Lion, and something about resetting some part of the software. I cannot find that thread now.

Is it possible this could involve the seller upgrading whatever version of OS this computer came with from Apple to Mountain Lion 10.8.4 could be affecting the built in camera?

I also found a post where resetting the PRAM, or whatever its called, fixed the problem. So I did the same.... I turned the computer off, then I held down Command, Option, and the P and R keys simultaneously right after depressing the power button.

Still no camera upon launching Photo Booth.

Is it possible this could involve the seller upgrading whatever version of OS this computer came with from Apple to Mountain Lion 10.8.4 could be affecting the built in camera?

Click to expand...

No, that should have nothing to do with the camera not working. Also, I didn't suggest the PRAM reset because that also does not affect the iSight camera. If the System Management Controller had failed that would impact the camera but resetting it should have worked if that was the case.

As I advised you above, contact the seller and get a refund or have them exchange the MBP for a working machine that you paid for.