Macbook pro major issues

Iceman

Iceman

Iceman

Soldato
Joined
6 Mar 2004
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Hi all just been given a Macbook Pro 13" mid 2012.
Was told the screen was faulty, upon further inspection its looks as though it may have had water damage at some point but can't confirm.
Hard drive missing but other than that all there.
Now with the power cable connected the mac does the normal start up chime, but doesn't seem to do much else.
Now is there a way to see if the screen is faulty or if its a logic board issue?
I was thinking about getting a mini display port to hdmi to see if it did out put any picture at all but, I'm unsure how long before it would output to an external monitor. Is it as soon as it posts or once OSX has loaded.
Any help/advice links would be great.

Thanks.
 
In my experience getting the chime is a good start. Have you tried holding down the various startup key options to try single user mode / recovery mode? do any of those work? Tried an SMC reset / pram / nvram reset? Working through all of these would be a good first start.
 
To be honest I'm not too clued up when it comes to testing resetting things. Thing is the macbook doesn't power up with just battery connected but as soon as i plug the power cord it just turns on. So not sure how i would go about resting the Pram etc.
Aslo would i need a hard drive in to boot to any sort of menus/diag screens?

Thanks for the quick reply..
 
SMC reset is going to be a good first step then I'd wager.

SMC Reset

If the battery is nonremovable

Shut down the Mac.
Plug in the MagSafe or USB-C power adapter to a power source and to your Mac.
Using the built-in keyboard, press Shift-Control-Option on the left side of the keyboard, then press the power button at the same time.
Release all keys, then press the power button again to turn on your Mac
Click to expand...

Then I'd do a NVRAM Reset if that doesnt get it

Resetting NVRAM

Shut down your Mac.
Locate the following keys on the keyboard: Command (⌘), Option, P, and R.
Turn on your Mac.
Press and hold the Command-Option-P-R keys immediately after you hear the startup sound.
Hold these keys until the computer restarts and you hear the startup sound for a second time.
Release the keys.

After resetting NVRAM, you may need to reconfigure settings for speaker volume, screen resolution, startup disk selection, and time zone information.
Click to expand...

If neither of those get it try booting into recovery mode. Obviously you wont be able to do any disk recovery etc if you don't have a hard drive. But I'd say if you can get the recovery environment to load it's fair to say the mac is fine and it's worth buying a hard drive for.

Start up from OS X Recovery

To start up from OS X Recovery, hold down Command (⌘)-R immediately after turning on or restarting your Mac. Release when you see the Apple logo. If you can't start up from OS X Recovery, try holding down Option-Command-R to start up from OS X Internet Recovery
Click to expand...

If none of this works I'd be considering it dead I'm afraid.
 
Hi there tried both Nvram and SMC resets last night but whenever its plugged into the mains it turns itself on.
Will try the recovery option tonight, would I be able to do this whilst using an external monitor? As if it is just the screen then I cant see what its doing. I do have hard drives lying around so that's not an issue I just don't want to buy a new screen if its not going to fix it.
 
Oh yeah sorry also not sure if the power button actually does anything its hard to see whats going on with no screen lol.
 
I think it should work on the external screen, I've never actually tried it myself though but I'd hope the default behaviour would be to duplicate so it's definately worth a shot.
 
External screen should work from boot pretty much I think. If you know what version of OSX its on you can find out how to get into recovery (cmd+r on current version). Pretty sure external screen will work once you get it into recovery screen regardless of whether it works earlier than that.
 
Right ok thanks for the help guys I think I need to try and get hold of a mini display adaptor and take it from there.
 
Hi guys did something silly tonight. Took the bottom cover from my older macbook (white unibody) took the screen from the macbook pro and plugged it into the old macbook. Heard a pop (well i think i did) now the old macbook screen won't come back on.. Have i now got another faulty Macbook???
 
You disconnected the screen from your macbook pro and tried to plug it in to an old unibody macbook? I'm amazed you got it to work at all, but yea I'd imagine they expected different voltages / watteges etc and you've now broken that one. Especially if you heard it pop.
 
I did do that yes but the MacBook Pro screen didn't come on either just thought I heard a pop and now the older MacBook is connected as normal the screen stays black and doesn't display anything. Can still turn volume up and down put caps lock on and off so it still operates but nothing on the screen. Daft thing to do now looking back. Gutted ain't the word!!!!
 
Slight update question about my old white macbook where the screen seems to not work.
Got hold of a mini display port to hdmi lead. The display to the tv works fine, but also i noticed that when i put my iPhone torch against the screen i can see the display. Anyone know if there is a fix for this or what may be the cause??

Thanks.
 
you just fried your backlight fuse on the 820-3115 Macbook Pro 13" 2012 logic board .
if is fried then you will need to replace it with a soldering iron.

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or worst you might have burnt other backlight components on the logic board.
 
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your LVDS connector (LCD connector) or the small resistor and capacitors on the logic board is likely to be burnt. look for corrosion on the board with a microscope.

dont ever put a known good working screen on a water damaged logic board, you will definitely create a short.

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