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.
If you are tired of fixing your laptop and want to sell it for parts you can do it here:
Any Notebook Part – free classifieds. Only laptop stuff.
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December 17th, 2006 at 12:17 pm
Considering the explanations I solved my problem. Some additional explanations can be helpful for others. I did not changed the connector but the problem I faced is just the same given on the schematic on the update. The multilayer printed circuit board can not work fine with a damaged via. You can resolder the connector at the solder side and resolder at the component side. The key point is extended soldering duration can help solder element penetrate well enough to solve the problem.
December 15th, 2006 at 7:19 pm
There is a class action lawsuit against Toshiba for problems on certain models. See this website: http://www.a70m30xsettlement.com/
December 14th, 2006 at 12:54 am
[...] I think you might have a few different problems at the same time. First problem: the laptop switches to battery power even with connected AC adapter. Most likely you have a faulty power jack. It’s either broken or loose. It’s a known issue with Satellite A70/A75 laptops and you can fix it by replacing/resoldering the power jack or relocating it outside laptop case. It also could be a problem with the power cord. Find a multimeter and check the AC adapter. See if the power cuts off when you jiggle the power cord. If it does, replace the adapter. Second problem: the battery will discharge from 100% to 90% and then jump to 0%. It sounds like a bad battery. [...]
December 10th, 2006 at 10:33 am
Just wanted to thank you guys for the great help!
I bought a couple of A70’s from Laptop Depot in Calgary, not being at the time that they were refurbished, not new.
No wonder they were only $1,000 each. With one of the laptops, I had the crashing problem from day 1, and not too far off,
the battery charging problem. Eventually after 7 months it wouldn’t charge at all, so I brought it back, just to find out
my warranty was only 3 months long. Since I was from Canada, the 12 month extended warranty from Toshiba was also ineffective…
they told me so.
Laptop Depot told me it’d cost $45 to determine the problem, and when I pried some more, they said when they have problems
like this, it’s always a motherboard replacement fix, which usually runs $500-600. Furious, I took my laptop home, and found
this article on the web. I bought 4 DC Jacks from ebay for $30 including shipping, a soldering iron for $20, and used some
wire I had laying around. The first solder job lasted less than 24 hrs, the 2nd about the same, the 3rd has been working
for days now. The trick… clean the motherboard and connection well with fine steel wool before soldering, use 63/37 solder,
and 15 watt iron.
Many thx again!!
December 9th, 2006 at 9:05 pm
I actually tripped on my Dells powercord and the DJ jack fell out. How exactly would i fix this?
December 7th, 2006 at 8:34 am
I noticed that the power cord for my AC adapter is slightly frayed in one spot. My laptop powers on fine, but the battery still will not charge. Could this be the reason? Would it be possible for it to work enough to power my laptop but not enough to charge the battery, even when the computer is off? Thanks.
December 7th, 2006 at 7:57 am
Did T. Haskell get his harness fixed? I have an A15-S128 no-power problem as well. First I replaced the AC adaptor cos I thought that was the problem. Now I guess I’m going to try getting a new harness assembly, but I wondered if a new harness did the trick for Tim or if there is something more. Thanks.
December 6th, 2006 at 11:00 am
The prong from the DC power supply (that you plug the AC adapter into) broke inside of my AC Adapter cable. Its stuck in about half a centimeter, and stuck tight. I ordered a replacement DC power jack, but how do I get the little prong out from my AC adapter?
December 1st, 2006 at 8:22 pm
I had the same power problem everyone else here seems to have. My M35X would only power on if the power cord was jiggled. Then the power jack came out completely. I bought a repair on ebay which isolated the jack so there was no stress to it. It seems to work fine. However, when I plugged it in, the computer would power up fine, but the battery wasn’t charging. I figured that it was just a dead battery so I bought a new one on ebay. That battery came and I let it charge. The orange charge light went on, so I figured everything was ok. But the battery wouldn’t charge past 10%, which is the level it came at. I left it charging for a whole day and its still at 10%. Any ideas as to what might be causing this would be greatly appreciated.
December 1st, 2006 at 12:17 am
Cam,
Toshiba Satellite A70 has a memory module integrated into the system board. If it goes bad you’ll have to replace the entire board.
This question I keep asking myself over and over again. I don’t know. I wish I had a scrap motherboard with a failed RAM so I can cut it off the board and try to run it with an external memory module. I guess it’s possible but I’m not sure if the BIOS requires the onboard memory to be present in order to work properly.
I’ll try it as soon as I can find a bad board. At this time I have no answer for you my friend. BTW, if you purchased your laptop in the USA, I believe Toshiba has issued a warranty extension for this model even for out of warranty units. Call them and find out if you can fix it for free.