Toshiba Satellite M35X and Satellite A75 power jack and battery charge problem
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.
Entry Filed under: Toshiba Laptop Problems
633 Responses to “Toshiba Satellite M35X and Satellite A75 power jack and battery charge problem”
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Pages: « 64 … 45 44 43 42 41 [40] 39 38 37 36 35 … 1 » Show All
June 3rd, 2007 at 11:28 pm
Tom,
I think water went down to the motherboard and damaged it. It’s necessary to disassemble the laptop apart and take a look at the motherboard. Most likely you’ll see corrosion on it.
May 31st, 2007 at 3:26 pm
I have a satellite as well, spilled water on keyboard she boots up fine, fan works, but when I try to use dc power it turns off. I tried to buy a new dc power adapter but it has the same result. sometimes i can keep the computer off and charge the battery, but there must be a better way. Hope you can help. Oh yes, i did the terrible thing of trying to turn on the computer after it shut off from the initial water spill. I dont think i fried the mother board because I still can boot up and still see normal operations. The problem is sometimes it turns off when i plug in dc, others the dc will be in and shut off randomly. Thank you, this is a great forum. tom
May 31st, 2007 at 5:19 am
I have an A70 with this problem and repaired once and now doing it again after 1 month of use.
I purchased Laptop from an Ontario, Canada Future Shop Store.
I called Tech line for Toshiba in canada and they say the problem is only in the states and not here. Why then is mine doing this and not covered by extended warranty ??
May 27th, 2007 at 10:12 am
Thanks for the previous help… I finally think it’s a mobo proble
Now I have a Compaq Evo N610c which won’t boot up with the AC (I think it’s a bad power dc) anyway I tried with a fully charged battery and the battery LED on the laptop blinks 8 times… nothing else. Any help related to this issue??
Thanks!
May 24th, 2007 at 9:02 pm
Wesley,
Check if the cooling fan is plugged into the motherboard. Make sure the fan spins.
It’s possible that the laptop shuts down because you forgot to connect the fan and it overheats. Also, did you remove old thermal grease from the CPU? Did you apply a new layer of thermal grease?
May 24th, 2007 at 4:59 am
I’ve just fixed a broken dc power jack on my advent 7085 and everything appears to be fine all systems work ok the battery appears to be charging etc but after bout 20 mins the whole laptop just shut down like the battery is dead but this cant be so as it always responses to the adater going in and the power unit on the task bar changes? Im scratching my head here could it be something else to do twith the processor maybe…
May 23rd, 2007 at 9:35 pm
Com,
Check the AC adapter. Then minimize the laptop as much as you can. Remove battery, hard drive, DVD drive, wireless card (if you have any), try installing a known good memory stick. If you still experience the same problem, most likely you have a faulty motherboard.
May 23rd, 2007 at 9:32 pm
Joe,
If the laptop works with the external screen then most likely there is nothing wrong with the motherboard and the problem is somewhere inside the display assembly. It might be just a loose connection between the video cable and the LCD screen. Try reconnecting the video cable on both sides. If you bought this laptop in the United States, call Toshiba and ask them about extended warranty for Satellite M35X laptops. Toshiba extended warranty for this model.
May 21st, 2007 at 2:02 pm
I have a dell latitude d600 that usually, when i turn the power button on, all i get is flickering lights for three seconds, then nothing. I have noticed that sometimes if you rub the keyboard as it does this it works again, but this is rare. Occasionally (about 1 in a hundred times) the computer will boot, but the fan never works.
May 20th, 2007 at 10:00 pm
I have a Toshiba M35X and i have had for more than a year now. Couple of weeks ago the screen has gone black with little light on the back ground of the screen, but nothing shows. at first I thought the computer has crashed, but after some effort i found that the computer is OK, its ony the screen problem. I am using my Labtop now with connecting it to my a separate delll flat screen, but the screen of Labtop is still not working and i could not figure it out what the problem is it with screen.. Could you please advise me what to do. I have opened the computer couple of times, but still could not find the problem with the screen. Please advice..