# G3 ibook backlight probs



## wireleets (Mar 8, 2005)

My ibook has this problem that as I push the screen back the light goes off. I'm stuck in the bush of Zambia and want some advice before I go opening up my only form of (relatively) decent communication with the rest of the world. Any ideas/help most welcome. I do have some tools that may get me in.
Thanks


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## MSY-Houston (Dec 5, 2004)

wireleets said:


> My ibook has this problem that as I push the screen back the light goes off. I'm stuck in the bush of Zambia and want some advice before I go opening up my only form of (relatively) decent communication with the rest of the world. Any ideas/help most welcome. I do have some tools that may get me in.
> Thanks


Sorry--I'm not sure exactly what you mean by push the screen back and which light. I do know that the screen can appear blank if the ambient light hits it just right.


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## MSM Hobbes (Apr 23, 2004)

Zambia!!! Yikes!!! Almost had to travel there once, but thankfully didn't go. 
No offense at all intended; wonderful warm people, but good golly, ya cain't drink the water, cain't eat the fruit, cain't do much besides worrying about which bug is gonna get ya, be it a skeeter, fly, etc. or the civil war...  Not a place for this Ozark mountain hillbilly boy [altho' did go as far as getting all the shots... ]

Anyhow, if I understand your situation correctly, your lcd screen is going or gone out, esp. when ya open the laptop ["pushing the screen back"]? From what I've seen & heard, main two causes are (a) wire crunkled at the pivot point, and/or (b) bad logic board.

Have you seen this link: http://www.apple.com/support/ibook/faq/
This one too may be pertinet: http://schwarztech.us/articles/schwarzibookcable.shtml

FYI: the serial number its under the keypad, upper right side.

Good luck!

Oh, one more link: http://apple.slashdot.org/apple/04/01/14/228225.shtml?tid=137&tid=180 discusses in quite depth this issue: "I've recently bought an iBook, and it started having the very common backlight problem. Basically, there are two types of things that can cause the problem: either the screen hinges pinching the cables, which is pretty easy to fix if you're not scared of opening things up; or it could be the logic board, which is what happened in my case. I've heard of someone being able to fix it by doing a bypass operation on the board, soldering a wire before the break and soldering it directly on the backlight connector. Aside from that, however I haven't been able to find much about how to fix that particular problem. Have any of you iBook-owning Slashdot readers had to repair your iBook like this? Any hints? If my repair is successful I'll surely snap a bunch of pictures and make a website, as this is a problem that affects a lot of iBook owners."

One link w/in this thread is: http://home.comcast.net/~stonent/screenfix.htm


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## LBee (Jul 12, 2007)

_ "I've recently bought an iBook, and it started having the very common backlight problem. Basically, there are two types of things that can cause the problem: either the screen hinges pinching the cables, which is pretty easy to fix if you're not scared of opening things up; or it could be the logic board"_

My Ibook g-3 700 laptop stopped lighting up, the machine commences to booting with the happy orchestra sonic, (ya know ) TADAAAAH! and proceeds to whirr up enthusiastically. Only no display, just dark.. Once when i tried with the screen open only an inch, It did come on and then flickered off, long enough though that I could see it boot with the little circle of lines going round.. but when I tried to open it all the way it went out.

It seems like a bad connection, because I did a thing that day I never do, I carried like in my arm, without nestling it a case, so Im thinking that carrying it that way maybe causes a pinched or loose connection. 0I'll just get another one anyway, but it seems like this machine is still booting just fine, just no lights. What about plugging it to a monitor, will it work USB? Could it be an inverter or just a bad display, and inverter is like 40 bucks. I have a local repair place that also sells all the parts, but I want to do it myself if possible.


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## LBee (Jul 12, 2007)

Okay I did go and and get some more info on this IBOOK dreaded dead backlight can of worms.. THeres a lot of info saying about how the logic board, OR the hinge is the case and this could be an ongoing issue into the newer laptops. etc etc.. 
but here:
http://engineroom.blogdrive.com/ go down to the december 8 post and this kind person has written a dissertation on opening the book and finding that one wire has become cut clean in two, and reparing it, but also the problem that there is very little room in there, I cant wait to try this; Wow that was a long sentence, eek. Thanks for the link above, since I guess thats how I found it.


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