“The consumer protection board in Denmark has found a design defect that causes the Apple iBook G4 to power down and leave a blank screen after about a year of use,” Antone Gonsalves reports for InformationWeek.
Gonsalves reports, “The Consumer Complaints Board of the National Consumer Agency sent the iBook to an independent electronics lab after receiving regular complaints from Apple customers in Denmark. Delta found that the problem stemmed from a solder joint that loosened slightly every time the iBook was turned off and on.”
“The board said its findings could have global implications, claiming that ‘thousands’ of Apple customers all over the world have tried to get the company to acknowledge the flaw and replace the computers. ‘The question now is whether Apple is going to go on denying that there is a design flaw in the same type of computer in the world outside Denmark’s borders,’ the board said,” Gonsalves reports.
Full article here.
my knob is enormous
question
“Can someone explain to me how a soldered joint gets loosened by turning the computer on and off?”
As was mentioned, thermal cycling does the job. Solder is not a very strong metal. A very large number of defective electronic units are do to either cracked or improper soldering. In fact, many times it is not even a case of the solder cracking but rather that the component was not ever actually soldered in the first place, just ‘touching’ and this eventually oxidizes and the connection fails. You may have read the countless complaints of iBook owners who have to put presure on their iBook at some point or it will crash, fail to boot etc. Well, it is almost certainly a failed solder joint in these cases.
I own a 12in. 1Ghz iBook G4, as do several of my friends. Vintage is early 2004, I have a shoulder bag that allows me to carry it in the field when I’m doing wildlife and scenery work with my Camcorder and Digital camera, I live in the mountains of Colorado and in good weather I can be in the wild for several days at a time, my iBook has been banged around quite a bit. To date the number of problems with my iBook and those of my friends is 0. Wonder what the Vikings are using their iBooks for, maybe shields when they go a viking. I’m a retired electronics eng. tech. (used to work for Apple) and I don’t buy the bad solder joint story, solder joints don’t loosen slightly every time a switch is pushed, they crack or break and once that happens the unit is nonfunctional until the joint is re-soldered, not a big job for a competent repair center. The Apple manufacturing plant in europe used to be in Ireland, and I think it still is, the Irish plant has a service repair center that is one of the best. It Could be a limited problem with the process at the Irish plant, doubt that its world wide, Apples QA is very good.
in today’s other news…
Danish Consumer Board finds design defect in White Star Line’s “Titanic”-class ocean liners, says hull may not withstand impact with icebergs…
Danish Consumer Board finds design defect in DeHaviland Comet airliners, says metal fatigue around the rectangular windows may cause the fuselage to rupture when pressurized…
Danish Consumer Board finds design defect in Ford Pinto automobiles, says the mounting of the fuel tank behind the rear axle may cause a fire in a rear impact…
@question
don’t forget that Mac laptops can be switched on and off ( or rather woken up from sleep mode ) by opening the lid. It seems possible to me that the action of opening the lid could put a strain on a soldered joint if it were badly implemented.
@ibookfast
The only problem that you had after that incident is that the iBook demanded that you give it a beer everyday!
I’ve had the exact same issues as everyone else….NONE. I have an early 2004 iBook G4. Zero problems. Er, actually I did have one. I replaced the HDD through a mail order service and that drive died early this year. A week later the iBook came back with a new drive and still works great. I got a MacBook but feel hard pressed to sell the iBook as it’s handy having both. I don’t doubt people are having issues, but it’s got to be a line issue…not an Apple design issue.
“My G3 Lombard notebook…”
I think you never owned a Powerbook, you liar!
My wife is using a 7 year old clamshell iBook right now.
“Honey, do you want a new machine?”
“No.”
I’m not sure the power key has been used more than a half-dozen times on her machine.
And why the hell is a government agency worrying about a frickin’ out-of-warranty laptop?
Thanks for the answers. I can see the expansion/contraction for heating/cooling cycles causing this. I don’t think opening and closing the lid would though, since the problem is not with the hinge. In any case, wouldn’t the soldered joints in other electronics also be susceptible to this problem?
I assume that by “turn on and off”, they are referring to the power button? Good thing I never turn my iBook off then! Seriously, what’s the point? I just close the lid and put it to sleep when I’m not using it. I honestly cannot remember the last time I pushed that button.
In Australia there have been a number of cases that deal with the projected life of a computer and although there is a standard manufacturer’s one year warranty the computer’s life is seen as being in excess of one year.
Therefore if you do have a problem with a computer out of warranty then the manufacturer may still be liable. This means you do not need an extended warranty because the manufacturer is still liable. This is based on whether as a reasonable person, in a reasonable set of circumstances did not subject the machine to abuse and merely used the machine in a reasonable manner.
The projected life of a computer under this scenario is around three years…the life of an Applecare warranty. It’s just a matter of complaining to the manufacturer, then getting rejected and then passing the complaint on to the respective consumer’s affairs dept.
Once you involve statutory authorities in this process the matter tends to be resolved very quickly. And the cases have been documented and reported on. And Apple was one of the companies involved.
Is this also the case in other countries?
after about a year’s use… and they find out now?
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damn the danish really do drink too much!
true fact about denmark: they just banned drinking heavy liqour on the job. 10 proof beer and wine is still ok though!
gotta love em!
How about the lower memory card slot problem with the 15″ PowerBooks? They didn’t find that? Half of the PowerBooks in my company suffer from that syndrome. And how about the sudden shutdown in the MacBooks? Two out of three MacBooks in my company got that illness.
Geee… what to these people do? And what does Apple do?
Little, if nothing.
“Is this also the case in other countries?”
Certainly in the USA you should never assume that the warranty on a product is expired just because the manufacturer says so.
There are a number of state and federal laws that cover this kind of situation and provide additional relief.
wow… there is a serious amount of whining going on here.
ok, sure … laptops have problems, probably more than desktops. Some are design flaws too. no doubt. we all try to make good on the things in our life we screw up.
But the moment someone starts in on the conspiracy theories about how ‘they know’ apple is doing this on purpose to Fsck with them because they know that Steve Jobs knows that they share all their iTunes purchases with their friends by burning mp3’s onto audio disks so their friends can rip’em into their itunes collections…. I draw the line there buddy.
I got one of the last gen iBook G4’s, love it. Only downer is after 2 years of abuse, the battery only works for like 3 hours (yeah i knew it was gonna happen). But as a college student, I haven’t exactly treated it like i should, but it keeps trucking, its stays on until apple posts a new software update. I love this computer, and I’m hoping to get another mac soon, but with regards to the article, if I get some free swag or repairs out of it awesome, if not, so be it.
Also one thing i’ve noticed, if Apple actually has a hardware issue, they go out of their way to repair the part and make sure it stays fixed, compare that to my friend who has had to return their HP laptop 5 times to replace different parts. So if this turns out to be an actual issue, i am sure that Apple will do their thing.
😀
just replaced the wife’s g4 ibook with a macbook because of this very problem. a real disappointment.
> Can someone explain to me how a soldered joint gets loosened by turning the computer on and off?
Since a blank screen is the symptom, I’m guessing that “turning the computer on and off” means sleeping and waking the computer by closing the “lid” (screen). This problem probably does not happen to people who leave their computers open on a desk most of the time.
(Apple laptop buyers should get AppleCare with their Macs)
I agree with ken1w,
Apple care was the greatest purchase I made for my laptop. it made it so easy to call in and ask and get things fixed (minor software issues), also its a great safety net.
Hmm…
I am currently writing this on a 1.2GHz iBook G4. It’s on it’s THIRD logic board. They seem to go bad about exactly once a year. I hope the current one goes before my AppleCare expires. I’ve already had a few mysterious power-downs or failures to wake from sleep.
A number of my friends have the same machine. A few of them have had the same logic board problems (computer shuts down, stops turning on, won’t wake up, grey screen, etc.), but many of haven’t had any issues at all. I don’t know if the failures are related to the amount of work I do on the machine or to other factors.
Just for a frame of reference, I leave my machine running pretty much 24 hours a day, and really tax it for at least 8-10 hours a day doing work (audio editing, audio production) and for recreation.
I’m always running lots of parallel applications, I leave the machine converting/encoding/processing audio files while I sleep. I would say I’m a heavy user, and I push the machine pretty hard, but physically, I take very good care of it. I never shut it down, just close the case and let it sleep.
I would expect other parts of the machine to fail first, but for some reason, it’s always this power issue.
The machine definitely had a manufacturing problem, which seems to continue with the replacement logic boards. My last Mac, an iBook G3 also had a failed logic board.
Thankfully, although I’ve had a number of problems over the last four years (with the G3 and then the G4), Apple has always replaced the logic boards quickly and with no questions asked.
However, if I hadn’t bought AppleCare, I would have been out of luck, even though it’s obviously an issue that Apple is aware of.
To student,
You say your iBook battery only lasts for 3 hours after 2 years. I think they only lasted about 3 1/2 hours when new. My 14″ G4 iBook is almost 3 years old, and it only lasts about 1 1/2 hours depending on what I am doing. No big deal since I use it while kicked back in my recliner and just keep it plugged in. I can’t justify the price of a new battery.
I also never use the power button. Sleep works so well on a Mac (unlike Windows) that I never shut it down – other than software upgrade restarts. This is about the best investment I have ever made. I read about people who have problems with their Macs and I do feel sorry for them, but it’s a little hard for me to relate since I have never had a hardware problem with any Apple product I have ever purchased. Could just be the luck of the draw, or the computer gods really like me. Knock on wood.
quote by Christian: “I even toss on top of my bed from across my room.”
sorry, couldn’t resist
hamdog
I’M FROM DENMARK 😀
Although I havn’t heard much about this before…
Re: REALISTA – failing lower ram slot on 15 powerbooks.
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Apple has a two year extended warranty (1 year extra) on that. Just got a new logic board myself (on last day of those 2 years
So take your pbooks to apple asap..!