My MacBook Crashed And Now I Can’t Reboot The Computer [Ask MacRx]

By

Computer-Angst.jpg

A crashed computer is one of life’s annoyances. A crashed computer that you can’t subsequently reboot becomes a bigger headache. Sometimes the battery in a laptop can be the culprit:

My Macbook froze out of nowhere. I have only had it for a few months. I purchased it new. I tried pushing the restart button and option/command/esc (what it says in the manual to do) but none of that works. My mac is totally unresponsive. What should I do?

Thanks in advance,
Andrea

Hi Andrea,

Your Mac may have crashed and still be running off the battery, as I’ve seen that happen before. You can try removing the battery; on a unibody MacBook that requires taking the bottom cover off (and lots of tiny screws). Remove the battery, wait a few seconds, replace it, then see if you can get things started. However this is not an option for the faint-hearted, or if you don’t feel comfortable working inside your system.

Otherwise since it’s just a few months old and you’re still under warranty, the easiest solution may be to bring the system to an Apple Store Genius Bar and have them suss out the issue.

Thank you for responding. I unplugged my Mac and had it all boxed up to go to the store today. When I woke up this morning, I plugged it back in and pushed the start button. It came on and all my screens reappeared. I had an error message that my time and calendar was set for a date sooner than Jan. 2008. This made absolutely no sense to me b/c I didn’t make any changes! I checked my settings to make sure the date and time were correct and they were!! My computer works just fine now. It was so weird and still makes no sense! I’m just happy it works again! Thank you so much though.

Actually that behavior supports the possibility that the computer had crashed and was running off the battery. It will do this off the main battery until that drains, then for a short while the smaller battery which retains settings like Date & Time will be used. Once it’s completely dead you can then plug it in and reboot; the date will be momentarily wrong then correct itself via the network.

Glad it’s working again. Take this as an advance warning to make sure you always keep a current backup of your data!

• • •

Readers, have any additional suggestions on this topic, or corrections/clarifications on the advice above? If so, please leave your thoughts in the comments.

Newsletters

Daily round-ups or a weekly refresher, straight from Cult of Mac to your inbox.

  • The Weekender

    The week's best Apple news, reviews and how-tos from Cult of Mac, every Saturday morning. Our readers say: "Thank you guys for always posting cool stuff" -- Vaughn Nevins. "Very informative" -- Kenly Xavier.