mac pro dead

johnson1

Hi Guys,

I have a mac pro 17" around 2008'ish. A few while ago it started to only power on if the battery was charged and wouldn't work just from mains power until after it turned on.
This didn't really bother me but yesterday it died and wouldn't come back on at all. I tried resetting the SMC but nothing. I started pressing everything and holding power on and off and it came on out of the blue but doesn't recognize the battery, (it has an x symbol) and the fans are running like mad.
I took it apart and cleaned the fans etc. but no change.
Is it time to move on ? or is it worth bringing in for repair ?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

Somecrimesitry

That X means the battery is dead, they only have a certain number of charge cycles before they go splat. A 2008 battery really should be dying by now, six years is pretty good going for a laptop battery.

I seem to remember that older 13" or 15" MacBooks would work fine on power without a battery even plugged in but on the higher spec 17" models they would only boot if there was a 7% or 10% minimum charge on the battery before they would boot. So if you pick up a replacement battery it should work fine.

If you ever need to check how many cycles have been used on a battery you can check in System Profile if you look at the link below. Very handy when buying a secondhand MacBook cause you should always ask for a few euro's be knocked off the price if the cycle count is high as you'll need to fund a new battery down the line.

http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1519

johnson1

Thanks Somecrimesitry that makes sense alright, I'll try that link later if I can get it to turn on and see if I can pick up a battery somewhere.

Thanks again.
Johnson