Category: geek

so here’s the rest of it. i went to the shop to get the mac back and i payed 42 euros for a 1400 euros repairing diagnosis. 1400?! well, that was my reaction too, might as well buy a new one, i thought.
basically i had to replace the logic board, the extra memory my friends offered me, the keyboard, the trackpad, the optical drive… you name it.

i got home in the evening and was getting ready to de-wire it piece by piece and take a good look inside, save the data, etc.
i was looking at it on my table and thinking how stupid the accident had been, and out of the tiny little bit of hope or disbelief i had left, i just put the battery back on and touched the power button.
and it worked.

i choked at the familiar noise and light on the screen. i think i stared at it for a while before actually putting my hands on the keyboard for typing the password. and it also worked. the keyboard, the touchpad, the memory, it was all there. the ‘a’, ‘s’, ‘c’ and ‘m’ letters on the keyboard were even missing – which prooves it is my ibook :D i didn’t know whether to laugh or cry, so i did both. :P

well, it’s not 100% working. the dvd drive still has the ally mcbeal cd stuck inside (thanks lulu! :P) which isnt detected by the ibook – something broken or just disconnected? the right shift key doesnt seem to be working and the computer wont always go to sleep when i tell it too, or when i close the lid.
but 1400 euros? please…

i went back to the shop yesterday and got my money back. naturally.
“apple authorised service providers”? yeah, right. did they even bother to open my computer? i have my doubts. maybe it was just there somewhere in a shelf, for a week (!!) and they thought they could trick me into buying them a new one. and all they had to do was to turn it on.

does anyone know the right means to tell apple about this?

(some people have asked whether it smells. yes, it does. :)
no stains, but a little smell, when you snif the keyboard. now i have a ibook that matches my website – how cool can that be? :P)

(or the new story behind the name of this website)

last tuesday i was working and as always, i had my ibook on one of the desks i use at work. on the other one there’s a big desktop pc, with lots of software… all in dutch. that was the main reason i was using the ibook, it made it easier for me to work if i understand where the tools and functions are.
then, in the same table of the ibook, there was a cup of coffee and milk (what we ironically call a “meia de leite”). can you guess where this is going already?
that was basically it. i knocked the coffe down, close enough to bath4 the ibook with about half of it (we’re talking about dutch coffee here, the full cup kind, not the short mediterranean expresso variety).

fast forward the images of ana running to the kleenex box, screaming “ohnãonãonãonãonão”, force shutting the computer, removing the battery, the keyboard, the memory and cleaning as much liquid as she could off the soaked logic board, while secretly praying to the apple god for a little miracle.
15 minutes later, having cleaned what i thought was the most of it, i tried to start it again. and it worked. for about 3 minutes. after that, the screen started to flicker a bit and then the whole thing just died.

that was it. i took it to the nearest apple center and, though i still don’t have a definitive answer on what caused the problem, they seem to think i damaged the motherboard.

can you see where i went wrong there?
besides the whole leaving-a-full-cup-of-coffee-by-the-computer thing. :| (and yes, i do realise how stupid* that was…)
well, impatient and atheist, i didn’t really wait for a miracle, did i? i read afterwards that i should have waited at least a full day before turning it back on again, to allow it to dry and not cause any short circuits in the board. i guess i panicked.

if it happens to you, at least i hope now you know what to do. i wish i had read it somewhere before. :| it’s one of those things…

* stupidity is a clause a simple warranty won’t cover. i checked.

i asked whether it could be fixed and he shruged his shoulders and looked at me.

“what did you have on it? anything important?”
“everything. and a chinese ally macbeal dvd”.