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
626 Responses to “Toshiba Satellite M35X and Satellite A75 power jack and battery charge problem”
Pages: « 63 … 11 10 9 8 7 [6] 5 4 3 2 1 » Show All
Pages: « 63 … 11 10 9 8 7 [6] 5 4 3 2 1 » Show All
April 15th, 2006 at 12:55 pm
I have a Toshiba Satellite A75, and it has been having the overheating problem and the DC jack problem. A friend and I opened it and cleaned out the heatsink. We also tried to resolder the DC jack back in. When I turned it on and attached the adapter, I smelt a burning smell, and now my laptop does not power up at all. Would you happen to know what is wrong with it?
April 15th, 2006 at 10:55 am
Hi Dave,
You can try to remove the battery and try to start the laptop from the AC adapter. If your laptop will not run when the battery is removed then I guess you didn’t re-solder the jack correctly. When I re-solder the jack, I usually test it before I put inside the laptop. To test if it works properly you need only the system board, the CPU with heatsink and fans attached and the memory. Connect it to an external monitor and plug the AC adapter. When you turn it on you should get a video on the external monitor. If you cannot start it, check the DC jack.
April 15th, 2006 at 6:51 am
I have a Toshiba Satelite P30, and have had the same problem with the DC jack, I have stripped it down and resoldered the faulty pin. When I switched it back on first time it worked fine until the battery went flat. Now when i plug it in, the DC LED on the front flashes (approx 2 or 3 times a second) and the fans go on and off. but I cannot charge the battery or switch the machine on.
Does this mean I have not fixed the problem at all? Or have I done more harm than good by having a go myself?
Any help appreciated!
April 10th, 2006 at 8:36 pm
Hey Frank,
That is a tough one. I just looked up on Toshiba Tech website a diagram for Toshiba Satellite A45. Even though the DC jack is not connected to the system board directly, it is still a part of the system board. The DC jack harness is soldered to the system board. I went through the part list for this model and didn’t find the DC jack listed. I also tried to search eBay without any luck. Sorry, cannot help.
April 10th, 2006 at 12:29 pm
I’m having trouble finding a DC-in jack for a Satellite A45-S150.
PSA4OU-OFOQ4V
Do you have one or know where I can obtain one?
Thank you
And great site, too !!
April 7th, 2006 at 8:11 pm
Hey Gary,
Toshiba Satellite A70 and A75 has the same jack as Satellite M35X. When you remove the system board from the laptop, you can wiggle the DC jack and see witch connector has to be resoldered. When I resolder the DC jack, I usually remove it from the system board first. Then I clean up all four legs and apply new solder coat on it. After that I clean traces on the system board (both sides) and apply new coat on them too. Finally, I put the DC jack back in place and solder all 4 legs.
95% the DC jack fails because the “+” leg looses the connection with the trace.
April 7th, 2006 at 4:10 am
Hey,
Can you tell me exactly where to solder for a A75 - S211 DC jack. Is it the same as the M35X. I took apart the laptop to see if the Flickering LED / Shutdown prob was due to the DC Jack and it seems so, as the jack seems to be moving around loosely.
Thanks for your help in advance
April 6th, 2006 at 5:36 am
After I had used your guide to disassemble the A70 and fix this problem I found this post about the power jack. I must say you are right on with this one. The power jack was exactly as you described it, cracked at the base where it connects to the system board. Too bad I did the soldering before finding this page. It would have saved me some time..
A million thanks!
.fri
April 4th, 2006 at 10:15 pm
[…] Poorly designed DC-IN power jack on the system board. Overtime, the DC power jack gets disconnected from the system board. If it happens, you will experience a problem with charging the battery or the laptop may not start at all. Read more: Toshiba Satellite M35X and A75 power jack and battery charge problem. Toshiba Satellite 1900 laptop looses power and shuts down without warning. […]
April 4th, 2006 at 2:58 pm
Oh, the adapter is fine, its a kensington universal 120 watt. I test 10 -20 laptops with it a day. Check me out on ebay under e-b-s