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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November 4th, 2007 at 11:21 pm
Milton Hetrick,
I think it’s necessary to remove the motherboard and take a closer look on the power jack. By the way, I just published a new disassembly guide for this model.
November 1st, 2007 at 10:20 am
I have a Toshiba a35-s209 was having issues with the battery charging and running off just the power supply towards the end if i moved the plug where it connected to the power jack to get the battery to charge all lights would flicker . Toward the end it started smoking . I pulled the heat sink out to get a better look at the jack .
The proccesser came out with it. Put proccesser back in put gel on it and heatsink back in after sleaning it . a friend tried to resodier the jack from the bottom side of the computer. Still when I plug it in it smokes and if I try to boot it The power light comes on the fans come on then everything stops is there any hope?
October 26th, 2007 at 7:41 pm
I fixed soldering both parts of motherboard, see picture
October 25th, 2007 at 9:27 pm
Melanie,
If you still have the same problem then they didn’t fix it. It’s possible they installed a “new motherboard” with the same problem, it happens.
Send it back to the Toshiba depot or any local authorized repair center and list all problems you are experiencing with this computer. It’s still under warranty until November 7, 2007.
No, I don’t think so. In this case Toshiba replaces the motherboard.
October 25th, 2007 at 10:18 am
Thank you for having the information that I needed.
October 23rd, 2007 at 6:07 pm
I have a Toshiba m35x-s114 and just finished re soldering the power jack to the motherboard. Your instructions are worth GOLD! In the beginning, after putting the laptop back together, it would start up for about 1 minute and then die. Then I read the post by the person who attached the jack with wires externally. What was happening with my laptop is that the motherboard kept shorting out because my soldering points were “too high”. I covered the points with tape and BAM, the laptop works great now. I can’t thank you guys enough! If I had one simple addition, then that is to clean up the heat sink and the cpu cover and re apply the heat sink compound. If you’ve taken your laptop apart a few times like I did during this process, then the compound is worn off and dried up.
All the best!
g-
October 22nd, 2007 at 12:11 pm
Hi, thanks for posting this. I shipped my A75-S206 back to the Toshiba depot along with this page. Today I got them back and guess what, I still have exactly the same problem. The battery light still wouldn’t lighten up. On the depot website it says “replaced sys bd top cover,” do you think that was necessary to fix the problem? Also under the subject it says “NB Is Not Charging / AC/DC Input Jack lose SATELLITE A75-S206.” Do you think they just tightened the input jack but when in fact the problem is inside between the jack and the system board as you described?
Also, now I’ve got a new problem. I put the volume switch on the side of the laptop all the way to minimum, but I still can hear the sound. Can you tell me what the problem is?
Thank you sooooooooooooooo much.
October 13th, 2007 at 6:58 pm
Frank Edgar,
Did you remove the CPU during disassembly process? Make sure the CPU is properly seated inside the socket on the motherboard and the socket itself is locked. Make sure the memory module is properly seated inside the slot. Just in case reseat the memory module and try installing it into another slot. Try another good working memory module.
You can find new motherboard if you search by the part number from your old motherboard. Usually the part number is located on a sticker and looks like this K000019630. This is just an example and you might have a different number.
October 13th, 2007 at 6:52 pm
dr ismail,
Yes, these instructions apply to the Satellite P35 too. Toshiba Satellite P35 power jack is kinda similar to Satellite A75 jack. If the laptop is still under warranty this problem should be covered by the warranty.
Some repair centers will offer you to replace the whole motherboard, some repair centers will repair the power jack. In my opinion, it’s not necessary to replace the whole motherboard unless the power jack got loose, shorted something on the motherboard and fried it. If the motherboard is still alive you can fix the problem by replacing/resoldering the power jack.
October 13th, 2007 at 8:17 am
Hi everyone, have a problem with my m35x. i fixed the dc jack successfully but there seem to be a problem with the board. the power leads comes on but the system won’t boot i.e its charging normally. the cpu fan hums for awhile and tunrs off. though i noticed some scratch on the resistors close to the dc jack base after soldering the dc jack. could it be the motherboard its gone bad and please how do i get a new board. please help.! thanks