A bad connection between DC-IN power jack on the system board and the system board is a very common problem with Toshiba Satellite M35X and Toshiba Satellite A70/A75 notebooks. If your laptop is out of warranty, then you can fix the problem by resoldering DC-IN jack on the system board. If it’s still under warranty, it would be fixed at no charge to you.
Problem symptoms:
- Laptop randomly shuts down without any warning.
- Power LED and battery charge LED start flickering when you wiggle the power cord or the AC adapter tip on the back or your laptop.
- The battery will not get charged.
- When you plug AC adapter, the laptop appears to be dead and there is no LED activity at all (DC-IN jack on the system board is broken).
To fix the problem, you have to take your laptop apart, remove the system board to resoleder or replace the DC-IN jack. Toshiba Satellite M35X and Toshiba Satellite A70/A75 disassembly guides will help you to remove the system board. Take a closer look at the power jack on the system board with a magnifying glass. In most cases you get the power problem because of a bad connection between the DC jack and the system board, you’ll see a crack between the DC jack connector and the system board.
Here is an example of Toshiba Satellite M35X power jack. The crack occurs between the DC jack pin and the system board.
In some cases the connection is good, but the DC jack is bad itself. You can find a new DC jack for Toshiba Satellite M35X and Toshiba Satellite A70/A75 laptops here. Search for DC jack M35X or DC jack A75.
How to resolder laptop power jack yourself.
UPDATE:
Sometimes, after you replace the jack, you can see that the system board doesn’t get power at all. The battery will not charge and the power LED will not light when you plug in the AC adapter. So, here’s a possible explanation.
When a connection between the positive pin and the motherboard breaks (cracks), the power jack gets loose. You can feel it when you plug in the adapter plug. A loose power jack can damage the trace inside the hole in the system board. Take a look at the picture.
As you see, the positive pin goes through the hole in the system board and you solder it on the top side. Right? What if the trace between the top side and the bottom side is broken somewhere inside the hole? I’ve seen it before a few times. In this case everything looks nice and clean on the top side. When you plug in the AC adapter, you get normal voltage readings between “+” and “-“ pins on the top side, but the power DOESN’T go to the motherboard at all, because there is no connection between the top and bottom sides. Test with a multimeter if there is a connection between the top and the bottom.
If the trace inside the hole is broken you still can fix it. You can run a wire to connect the top and the bottom sides. Be careful not to short something on the board.
Update:
Here’s another solution to fix the power jack problem, it shows how to relocate the power jack outside the laptop base. Check it out here: Toshiba Satellite A75 failed power jack workaround.
When you repair a loose power jack, it’s a good idea to check the jack on both sides of the motherboard. When you remove the top cover from a Toshiba Satellite A70/A75 laptop you can see only points where the jack is soldered to the motherboard as it shown on the second picture in this post, but you cannot see the jack itself as it shown on the first picture.
Removing the motherboard from Satellite A70/A75 laptop is a good idea because the jack itself might has a broken “+” pin, as it shown on the picture below. If the “+” broke off the base, you’ll have to replace the jack.
UPDATE:
Today I received another well written and well documented guide about fixing Toshiba Satellite M35X power connector issue. This guide was submitted by Stephen Macuch. Thank you Stephen for great pictures and detailed instructions.
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July 27th, 2006 at 9:32 am
Hi guys excellent info her, many thanks to all fo you. i have atoshiba m35x laptop. same problem power jack. i soldered it. doenst work. and now my laptop dont even power up. i checked everythin.
i dont what happened
. will soldering effect the motherboard. i need help. i would apritiate if some1 could help me.
Many thanks in advance.
July 26th, 2006 at 9:51 pm
Just fixed the same problem with a new DC jack. I own 2 of the A75′s and had one warrenty.. I snet my one maching out and it came back reformated with a blank hard drve. I sent for the part and had the second one fixed in less thn 2 hours. one trick is to have a desoder pen to clear the ports.
July 22nd, 2006 at 5:35 pm
Thanks so much. This article and website saved me from just throwing my wife’s A75 out in the trash. A perfect tutorial on disassembly and insight as to the causer of our recharging problem. 45 minutes of effort and $8 for a soldering iron saved me hundreds.
July 16th, 2006 at 10:06 pm
[...] I think it could be a bad DC jack. I do not work with Acer notebooks, so it would be only my guess. Try to plug in the AC adapter and wiggle the plug inside the jack. Can you make LEDs to flicker by wiggling the jack? Try to press on the power button while you are wiggling the power jack. If you notice that you can start the laptop when you apply some pressure on the power plug (and power jack), then most likely you have a power jack issue. [...]
July 13th, 2006 at 4:13 pm
Tubster,
Even though the power problem has been fixed on your laptop, it might reoccur in the future, I mean near future. If it would be my laptop, I would probably buy 2 years extended warranty. I think that’s a good price for the 2 year extension. I ALWAYS buy an extended warranty on my laptops even though I know how to fix them.
July 13th, 2006 at 3:56 pm
Hey Bill,
I’ve never heard that the warranty on Toshiba M35X’s has been extended to 3 years. I’m not really sure if it’s true. Anybody can confirm it?
July 13th, 2006 at 6:20 am
Yesterday, I spoke with a guy at a local Toshiba authorized service center. Toshiba has extended the warranty for this issue to 3 years, and gave me the impression that would cover all m35x’s, and perhaps all machines with this issue..
The fix is a motherboard replacement, and he says the new motherboards have a redesigned beefier jack that fixes the problem.
July 13th, 2006 at 1:16 am
My M35x developed this fault (battery only charges when switched off, erratic power to computer). Out of warrenty by two months. International support referred it to UK customers services when I said that this seemed to be a recurring fault with this model. I also mentioned the class action, but said I just wanted it repaired. UK customer services came back to me and said that if it was the power fault they would repair it free of charge as this has been a problem with this model… phew. This took about a week and four calls (they aren’t great at getting back to you). Now considering whether to buy extended warranty for two years at £163, which they said could arrange as a good will gesture… I think I might just cross my fingers and put the money towards a stronger laptop. Any thoughts?
July 12th, 2006 at 11:00 pm
The bad connection really was a problem strange power/charging behaiviour. I bought a power jack from ebay and took my laptop(toshiba a75) apart according to the instructions and call my friend to help me to change the power jack. He saw the problem right away and said that I don’t need a new power jack.
I had an overheating problem also, which kept getting worse and worse, unless I simply vacumed where the fans are at the bottom ! And it helped a lot, if not solved it complitly.
thanks to everyone.
July 7th, 2006 at 1:49 pm
Hi,
I have same DC jack problems with my Toshiba M30/35X Satellite Laptop.From out side I can see that, DC jack is broken (Shaking) and I can’t use the same now.I am not that much confident to open and fix this problem.(Though, I got the repair manual;http://www.irisvista.com/tech/.....M35X_1.htm).
Please some body can help me on this, like if some body guiding me over the phone , so I can follow that….)If some body wants to give your time, pls contact me…..
Thanks,