Jurgen

I am asking for some guidance on how best go from an older OSX , for instance Maverick or Mountain Lion, which are often...

Yo, anyone here know why I have to keep on resetting my clock in my 2009 27"iMac. Does that mean that my little PRAM...

This Ebay purchase has a rich variety of unsatisfying boot up scenarios: Sometimes it boots very slowly with the HDD disc...

So I did an upgrade as I did many times before on this model using a 1TB WD SSD and the appropriate thermal sensor from...

I was asked to repair this MBP, because it was very slow in responding to mouse or trackpad clicks,as well as keyboard...

This one had endured a tropical rainforest, which fried the display, but was still working on external monitor. I think,...

The imac does boot and work, until the screen pixilates and freezes. GPU I would suspect, but would like some other...

I have a mid 2011 MacBook Pro which shows green light on mag, but will only boot if I disconnect the battery for a few...

Hi folks, I am trying to keep 2010 15”machines in circulation: I have been trying my hand at refurbishing these machines...

I did another replacement of capacitor C9560 on a 820-2850 board (2010 MBP 15” ), and it ran fine after with a fresh...

Thank you Ben, I will give that a try before buying a new used screen. Also wondering if anyone would upload a link to ASD155 and ASD156 so I could go over the whole machine

@mayer mayer , I have the pictures of my solar stuff on my profile page now. Did not get to the Sata issue here, I am fixing about 3 machines right now, most of them mired in the proverbial unknown…

If it works with the battery connected, as you say, but not without the battery connected, then leave the battery connected. I have seen the same issue. But since we want the battery connected anyways, just run it as such.

It is most likely the Tantallon capacitor on the logic board. It will need to be replaced by someone who knows how to remove the old one and solder on a more capable one . All the 2009/2010 17”machines have this weak spot, and will eventually pack it in. But the fix is easy, if you know how to solder and read the schematics.

I did send in the GPU and had it repaired in California, by http://stores.ebay.ca/brickfence. Not just a reflow, but had a new chip installed on the GPU, came to about US$ 140. After that I needed to replace the HDD as well. Since this model is very touchy about what HDD it wants, I needed to order a conversion kit for about US$40, so it now allows any old HDD, including even 2.5" SSD. This concludes my fix, she is up and running smartly now, for hopefully another decade.

OK, my GPU came back from "reballing"( $US 70) and now it is completely kaputt. Lesson learned. Reballing without chip replacement is a waste of money on these this GPUs. The 8800GS is a time bomb, no more, no less. Who wants my smoldering remains of a 24" 2008 iMac?

Hi YpeH, I had the same stripy pixelated thing on a fixer upper. Also suspected the logic board or graphic card. But I was wrong: When I booted it holding D to do the hard ware test, my monitor was showing no lines. I aborted the test, and booted from another external HDD, and it came up without the pixelated stripes. So I used that boot up to erase the build in HDD, which by the way had been maxed out, restored that HDD with a fresh OSX, and voila....no more stripes. My conclusion: Always fix the most likely component to fail: the HDD. Update (02/06/2019): @imacpain1 rich, I would say that the fix I found is still working: I did send in the GPU and had it repaired in California, by http://stores.ebay.ca/brickfence. Not just a reflow, but had a new chip installed on the GPU, came to about US$ 140.

Hi, I also found that after a spill frequently the power button will have shortened out. It is part of the keyboard assembly, and can be changed by replacing the keyboard. Inexpensive in parts, but labour intensive,,,some 100 tiny screws and all guts have to come out first. But it worked for me on a spill damaged machine.

I did what the guy did, whose report is posted above, and tah-da!!! the Imac is restored to its original pristine condition. This one had the discreet graphics card, I took it off, heated the chip on it 40 seconds , re Arctic Silvered it, took of the 2.7V battery to reset the logic board, stuffed it all back in, and IT WORKED.

I did not have any more "blackouts" for a few weeks now. After the vacuuming and installing the fan control software, it became happier. Then I even went the extra step and told my new Macs Fan Control to keep the ambient temp around 26 C and it does it. Never shut down again since

I would never remove those tiny plugs unless I absolutely have to. And we do not have to remove them, just the card itself…

I did not disconnect the tiny gold terminals, they are too fragile. I just slide out the card but leave it connected to the antenna, if replacing the logic board is the aim.

I had the additional GPU card, as mentioned by kevmacmills above, and needed to remove two Torx screws, one short one at the plastic separator, and one 7mm approx at the heatsink in the top right of the enclosure.

I did not even disconnect these cables, because they are easily damaged when reattaching. I just left them in their sockets and folded the whole assembly back and out of my way, when I needed to take out and replace the keyboard.

Nice, thank you Andrew Bookholt

If the cable broke, you can replace it for around $50ish. If the terminal broke off, I am afraid your logic board needs to be fixed(unlikely) or replaced.

I just replaced the logic board, and all went fine, as far as I can tell. However, my new battery is still in transit, i.e: I do not have it at hand. My question is, how critical is it to have a battery in this model....given all the "do not remove battery or else" warnings. Is it OK to try to boot it just with the regular power supply? I do not want to fry my new logic board, so I need some informed opinion on this...

Yo, I took out the logic board, because the display was not coming on. I had done all the other test to eliminate the chance that it was not the board.

It came out fairly easy, and I sent it away to California to get a new chipset installed to fix it. It came back, I stuck it back in, and voila, she booted up. I am thankful for your guide, it was easy to follow. Next I am replacing the logic board in an A 1286.