Today I received an email from Tony Sakariya (tsakariyaATyahooDOTcom) who was experiencing a problem with the power jack on his Toshiba Satellite A75 laptop. He’s been able to fix the problem by relocating the power jack outside the laptop case away from the system board.
I would like to share with others a tip for repairing their Toshiba A75 laptop for the DC Jack and battery charge problem.
I have a Toshiba A75-S209 for a year now. After the first 3 months it developed the exact same problem. Battery would not charge and I had to twist and turn the power jack to make the connection. Since it was in warranty, I returned it and they repaired and sent it back to me. The problem recurred again after about 4 months and I sent it again and they repaired it and worked fine for 5 more months and it failed. This is a design flaw with Toshiba. Now that I am out of warranty, I decided to repair it myself. Your guide for dismantling A75 was awesome. Thanks for the info. Now here is what I want to share with others. Resoldering the power jack with a new one does solve the problem for a while but it will reoccur. Hence I decided to bring out a wire with the Jack outside. Of course it looks dirty but it is a permanent solution. I am attaching the photo of the repair I did. I got the DC jack from ebay and insulated it with a electrical insulation tape. Now it is working fine, I do the connection and disconnection on the dangling power jack outside the laptop and hence no chance of breaking the soldering outside.
• Coil the pair of wire one round through the ventilation grill before taking it out as shown in the picture above. This is to prevent any external shock or force being directly transmitted to the soldering joints.
• Now we need to connect a new DC Jack to other end of the wire. I purchased the new DC jack from here for a price of $6. Shown in the picture above the white wire is the positive terminal (+) and hence must connect to the inner ring of the DC Jack. Similarly the blue wire being the negative terminal (-) should connect to the outer ring of the DC jack. Refer the picture below on how the wires are soldered to the DC Jack. Be careful not to short the leads as they are very close.
• Now neatly wind a round of insulation tape over the wire and especially on the exposed DC Jack exterior. This will prevent any short-circuit and also give a better appearance.
Toshiba Satellite A70/A75. Disassembly guide with pictures.
Valued Comments.
Submitted by Binney:
The workaround relocates the jack externally. When I did this, a short occurred between the metal casing on the top cover (the one removed with the guitar pick). This happens if the solder repair is too tall. I covered my repair with electrical insulation tape and that fixed the problem. It took me quite some time to figure out where the short was and would like to save others the headache.
Comments #282, 286 submitted by Jake and John:
Size N: DC Power Jack #274-1576 from radioshack works perfect and looks great. Costs $2.99, easier to solder, snugger fit, 5.5mm O.D. x 2.5mm I.D.
Here are some pictures of the end result of the repair with
the Radio Shack type jack. I added one of those quick release
key holder that I had lying around as a retention holder.Here is what it looks like unplugged: Power tip unplugged.
Here is what it looks like with the adapter plugged in and
the key holder reattached: Power tip plugged.
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April 22nd, 2008 at 3:33 pm
correction:..
I meant to say between the 16 and 18gauge wire. The 16gauge wire is my preferred choice as its 1.2mm core diameter is sufficient to carry the 6.3Amps current rating of the power pack with some room to spare.
By the way has anyone ever spliced the dc portion cable of a disused power pack of this model of laptop. I’m just curious to k now what gauge of cable is carrying the dc current.
April 22nd, 2008 at 5:13 am
Thanks everyone, I finally got this system to work following the advice i received on here. I even did the soldering myself. A Toshiba service center had asked for $600 to replace the motherboard.
And thanks Jimbo(Post 293) I experienced the same problem with the 24gauge wire. That gauge of wire is not even sufficient to carry the current rating of the laptop power pack and when u remember that resistance increases with length for a dc cable coupled with heat also then you will be having too much resistance in that small gauge of wire.
The main problem with the original power jack is that the connectors especially the +ve terminal doesn’t run through to the base of the motherboard so it doesn’t get firmly anchored. I also noticed that it heats up sufficiently. So the heat from the cooling fans may not be the only reason why the solder comes off. Anyway to successfully get this stuff working:-
1) …Use wires that can support at least 8amps of currently, I’d suggest about 16 – 18 gauge. or any wire that is at least 1.5 – 2 mm in diameter (core and not insulation). p/s convert to inches yourself:)
2)…Be careful not to connect the wires the wrong way especially when you want to solder the wire to the jack. If you do and you plug the adapter to the jack, you will end up shorting the fuse on the bottom surface of the mother board, a white chip fuse, I think its rated at 12 Amps (Sat -A75 model) This fuse is what actually makes it difficult to re-solder a loose jack or a new jack as it often has to be removed first on the A75 model that i have, but this work around method doesn’t bother with that.
3)….Use that black insulation tape or what ever type u have to insulate the top body shell from the solder point especially if its high..mostly unavoidable as you have to place a wire on the surface. U can insulate by taping the work area directly, or you c an put the tape on the part of the body shell that is directly above the solder point. Or u can just do both.
4)…You don’t really have to pass the wire through the vent, you can still pass it through the former jack hole but be sure to knot it on the inside to u can’t accidentally pull the soldered joint off. I thought about this because of the heat coming out of the vent and especially if smaller gauge wire was being used.
4)…Remember, this A75-S209 and the rest of the series, run very hot, very very very hot, so do not place it on your bed excepting u put it on some kind of solid flat surface. Else it will over heat.
Well I can eventually send pics if needed, and thanks again everyone.
April 19th, 2008 at 1:20 pm
deeps,
If you replaced battery and AC adapter but it didn’t help them most likely your problem is related to the power jack.
April 19th, 2008 at 7:02 am
I am having a problem with toshiba a75.when i connected to power the light is flickering.i tried to replace with ac adapter & battery .still i am getting the same problem.is it sure the problem is with dc jack.
April 18th, 2008 at 8:10 am
I did the radioshack repair and got rid of the terrible oe jack. The only thing I had trouble with was I had the negative wire on the wrong prong of the new jack as there are three. I’m getting pretty comfortable taking my A75-S211 apart now. Once I got it back together it works GREAT! No more wiggling the plug. I highly recommend doing this. Thanks for the pics and DIY. Somebody was going to charge me $200 to fix the old jack but this is much cheaper and more reliable I’m sure.
April 12th, 2008 at 6:08 pm
i did this but now my screen wont turn on and my wireless light isnt on… can anyone let me know what they think could be wrong?? i have the m35x laptop PLEASE HELP ASAP thanks drew drewh716@sbcglobal.net
April 6th, 2008 at 3:29 am
Does anyone have a circuit diagram for the Satellite A70 motherboard? My power jack was dislodged and pushed in too far and scraped about 3 tiny components from the mother board. I need the values of the components to replace them. I also think a tiny fuse next to the plug has blown. Alternatively I can take a very close-up photo of the damage and maybe together we can identify what’s missing. Thanks.
April 5th, 2008 at 7:23 pm
I too have a failed DC jack on my A75. The help posted on this forum are invaluable. I did the wokaround locating the jack externally as suggested on this forum. And it worked! I just wanted to help others by suggesting that if they choose to solder pls use the biggest wire possible. The first time i used the recommended 24 gauge wire and failed. The battery would charge fine but as soon as i turned on the computer it would still run on batt until it discharged itself and shut down. I figured it was because the computer was not drawing enough current thru the thin wire. The second time around I used a bigger size wire…18 gauge i think…and it powered the machine on A/C! Again thanks everyone who have helped me and many others get the most out of this shitty laptop
March 21st, 2008 at 10:07 am
I’m experiencing the same issue and have my A75 taken apart. I noticed that the adapter shows an output of 6.3 amps. What AWG wire should I use to keep this repair work safe?
March 18th, 2008 at 4:20 pm
I tried to fix the dc power jack so i removed the old one and soldered the new one..didnt work so I tried to remove the new jack and i broke off the piece that holds the pins on the left side. My motherboard has a very flimsy design, when all the pins are in the board the dc jack has no support on the bottom it looks like a docked boat with the dock on the front and sides. I wonder if there is a fix for this prob.