ibook G4 Help

the_viper2kie

Hey all,
Stressing big time at the moment! My ibook G4 seems to be on the blink, I bought it a little over 2 years ago.
Will try put in as much detail into this description maybe some of it is irrelevent but here goes,
Watch an episode of lost the night before last and put the machine to sleep as i went to bed. Walked into college the next day with it in my backpack about 1km. Woke it from sleep and was using it fine for about 5 minutes, surfing the internet-then the screen went black but the apple on the back was still lighting, pressed the power button a couple of times and nothing happened so i held it down to force a shutdown. Tried turning it back on and nothing would happen. Left it for about an hour and tried again and the machine booted up, entered my login, all my files were there, surfing the net and after a few minutes, black screen again.
This time when i tried to turn it back on the fan inside it started revving really loud and blowing a lot of air out of the back of the laptop. Only way to stop it was to remove the battery, tried again same problem the fan turned on. So i left it for a couple of hours and tried again, the laptop turns on and get a few minutes work out of it-the clock reset to january1 1970 but i suspect this is because i removed the battery from the back, maybe not-until it shuts down again! Then when i try it the fan goes again. I've now stopped tring it and going to leave it and ask you guys what you think or what i should do-I have no applecare warranty so gonna have to pay to get fixed i assume! Anyone suspect what it could be, loose connection or something more serious(video card, hard drive failure). Where should I go to fix it and how much its going to cost me, i'm a poor student and really missing it, all my exam papers and solutions are on it and 7 days to exams!
soupercomputer or tonyboy247, Zener, hughchal i see from another thread you guys have experience repairing, any opinions?

Thanks a million,

HK
I should probably note that over the last few months I realised that if the laptop was put down heavily on the table, it sometimes turned off, thats why i thought it was a loose connection, but it always started up fine after this. Only happened about 3 or 4 times though!

SouperComputer

PM Sent!

tonyboy247

well how did you get on .... if you need to get your work off the machine rapid your welcome to slap your hard drive into one of my systems get it backed up so the stress is off.. etc then deal with any warranty issues in due course.

the_viper2kie

tonyboy247 wrote:

well how did you get on .... if you need to get your work off the machine rapid your welcome to slap your hard drive into one of my systems get it backed up so the stress is off.. etc then deal with any warranty issues in due course.

Thanks Tonyboy and Soupercomputer for all your help,
Having searched the internet after souper suggested it was the logic board it is most definatly the problem! It turns out that its happening to many machines, ibook G4's manufactured around the time mine was february 2004. It cost between 500-600euro to get fixed and apple wont extend the warranty like they did for the ibookG3's and their logic board problems. I have been in touch with a guy from england who is leading the charge in bringing apple to extend the replacement program to G4's. He has been in contact with a lawyer in the US who is interested in setting up a class action law suit against them!
As regards the problem with exams, i was lucky enough to keep a backup of my machine-well the important files not an entire disc image on an external hard drive so i'm ok in that sense but i really appreciate the offers both tonyboy and soupercomputer. I barely have time to eat with all the study so going to leave the arguement with apple until after the exams. Plus i have nowhere near that sort of money to get fixed so i'll be computerless for some time i suspect if they wont do it for free!

Thanks again,

Hugh

Thumper Long

hello Viper if you want to PM me the serial number ill see if there is anything i can do, i work closely with an authorised repair centre and i can try and see if apple will do anything

the_viper2kie

Thumper Long wrote:

hello Viper if you want to PM me the serial number ill see if there is anything i can do, i work closely with an authorised repair centre and i can try and see if apple will do anything

PM sent...