HELP! A1398 Dead,
I bought a second hand Mid 2014 A1398 MacBook Pro when I lived in Australia. I'd bought it as a back-up machine because I had a Mid 2014 MacBook Pro, and realising it might one day fail, I wanted a backup machine because I don't like change.
Two weeks after buying MBP2, the seller called me to check if everything was OK with the unit, which I thought was odd. At that stage I might have turned it on a couple of times, but I'd not used it when he'd called. Over the last few years I used the machine seldomly because my original mac has been pretty OK. Every 3-6 months I'd charge it and turn it on.
When I would use it for a day or two, I noticed a problem with it waking up. Sometimes it'd not wake up, but it always eventually did, and I had no sequence of what woke it up, it was either the power button or closing and opining the screen, but because I hardly ever used it, it never bothered me that it had this issue. A few weeks back MBP2 started to do a boot loop on the chime. I disconnected the battery and it booted off the charger, worked fine, but throttled as MBPs do when only the charger is connected. I had only just recently started to use it more. Not much, just more than once every month or so.
I ordered a new battery, but after fitting the new battery the machine was still chime boot looping. I thought the new battery might have been a dud, and the battery seller (kindly) sent me a replacement, but the machine was still boot loop chiming. I consulted with Gpt and provided it with information about the boot up problem. It had me boot into safe mode (I think) and there was a Windows boot drive reference I'd not been aware of, maybe a partition for a virtual machine, I am not sure here because I have some memory issues (brain injury).
When I asked Gpt for advice it suggested cleaning out the windows boot partition that it seen in a screenshot I'd provided it. Gpt suggested an SMC and NVRAM reset, so I did what it asked including running the command sudo nvram -c, but when I tried to re-boot the machine it was dead. No keystroke option has worked to restart the machine since I deleted the window partition reference and completed the smc reset and ran the Nvram command. The last thing before it died was the Nvram command.
I have tried all of the start-up combinations and tricks that I've read across 5 different forums. I can barely use a multimeter but checked the board and it seems from the rails I checked on that those rails have the right power, but my checks were very limited. I read that unplugging all the board peripherals and trying to start the machine might work, but nothing. I unplugged the IO board and tried a restart, but even after unplugging everything but the keyboard (and then including the keyboard) I got no start, dead. All that happens is that the fans spin weakly. No matter what button combination the fans spin weakly. Shift+Ctrl+Option+Cmd +Pwr let go of the power, charger goes from orange to green, but only the weak fans.
I've read it could be the Vcore or SMC, and I could replace the SMC chip, but I didn't want to rush in. And I feel it might not be the SMC. I have only a soldering iron, no hot air. I am trying to fix this myself because I am poor, it's as simple and embarrassing as that.
Somebody else on this forum seemed to have a very similar problem, and I think they flashed the efi, but I am not sure about how to go about that. I have the equipment to flash a chip. I've included pics of the numbers on my board. Even though it says it's an A1398 on the case, I am not so sure about the board. I've included a pic of the top and bottom of the board. I apologise for being a noob, and I do have some skills, but I am not a tech, more like somebody who can follow instructions and who most times can fix things. ALL HELP is received with offerings to the gods for your long life and good health. I also took close up pics of the numbers on the board. Apologies if I've made a mistake by posting here. I'm firstly trying to confirm the MBP model I have, like if it is an A1398, and then I will try to get a brd file, and then I'd post to get help with diagnosing the problem, but (I feel) the first thing is to identify the board and get the correct drawings. I downloaded and installed boardview on my original mac.
Two weeks after buying MBP2, the seller called me to check if everything was OK with the unit, which I thought was odd. At that stage I might have turned it on a couple of times, but I'd not used it when he'd called. Over the last few years I used the machine seldomly because my original mac has been pretty OK. Every 3-6 months I'd charge it and turn it on.
When I would use it for a day or two, I noticed a problem with it waking up. Sometimes it'd not wake up, but it always eventually did, and I had no sequence of what woke it up, it was either the power button or closing and opining the screen, but because I hardly ever used it, it never bothered me that it had this issue. A few weeks back MBP2 started to do a boot loop on the chime. I disconnected the battery and it booted off the charger, worked fine, but throttled as MBPs do when only the charger is connected. I had only just recently started to use it more. Not much, just more than once every month or so.
I ordered a new battery, but after fitting the new battery the machine was still chime boot looping. I thought the new battery might have been a dud, and the battery seller (kindly) sent me a replacement, but the machine was still boot loop chiming. I consulted with Gpt and provided it with information about the boot up problem. It had me boot into safe mode (I think) and there was a Windows boot drive reference I'd not been aware of, maybe a partition for a virtual machine, I am not sure here because I have some memory issues (brain injury).
When I asked Gpt for advice it suggested cleaning out the windows boot partition that it seen in a screenshot I'd provided it. Gpt suggested an SMC and NVRAM reset, so I did what it asked including running the command sudo nvram -c, but when I tried to re-boot the machine it was dead. No keystroke option has worked to restart the machine since I deleted the window partition reference and completed the smc reset and ran the Nvram command. The last thing before it died was the Nvram command.
I have tried all of the start-up combinations and tricks that I've read across 5 different forums. I can barely use a multimeter but checked the board and it seems from the rails I checked on that those rails have the right power, but my checks were very limited. I read that unplugging all the board peripherals and trying to start the machine might work, but nothing. I unplugged the IO board and tried a restart, but even after unplugging everything but the keyboard (and then including the keyboard) I got no start, dead. All that happens is that the fans spin weakly. No matter what button combination the fans spin weakly. Shift+Ctrl+Option+Cmd +Pwr let go of the power, charger goes from orange to green, but only the weak fans.
I've read it could be the Vcore or SMC, and I could replace the SMC chip, but I didn't want to rush in. And I feel it might not be the SMC. I have only a soldering iron, no hot air. I am trying to fix this myself because I am poor, it's as simple and embarrassing as that.
Somebody else on this forum seemed to have a very similar problem, and I think they flashed the efi, but I am not sure about how to go about that. I have the equipment to flash a chip. I've included pics of the numbers on my board. Even though it says it's an A1398 on the case, I am not so sure about the board. I've included a pic of the top and bottom of the board. I apologise for being a noob, and I do have some skills, but I am not a tech, more like somebody who can follow instructions and who most times can fix things. ALL HELP is received with offerings to the gods for your long life and good health. I also took close up pics of the numbers on the board. Apologies if I've made a mistake by posting here. I'm firstly trying to confirm the MBP model I have, like if it is an A1398, and then I will try to get a brd file, and then I'd post to get help with diagnosing the problem, but (I feel) the first thing is to identify the board and get the correct drawings. I downloaded and installed boardview on my original mac.