iMac is beating me today

[HCHTech]

I knew this job was going to be trouble the moment he dropped it off.

It's a 27" iMac, from May of 2012. It was wall mounted, so there is no stand on the damned thing. The customer ignored bad disk warnings for several months until it just wouldn't run anymore, then brought it to me. Wonderful.

Incredibly, he has 2 separate external drives that were used by Time Machine - one from 12/14 and the other last used 5/15.

I pulled the original drive and set it aside for now as they reported it would no longer boot successfully.

The very first thing I noticed was that the keyboard wouldn't power on - no little green led when pushing the power button. No problem, I thought - let's replace those batteries and get on with it. 3 AA batteries came out, but strangely enough, 3 would not fit back in. The last one stuck out of the tube about 1/2" beyond the end. I remove the batteries and I see the little button housing that is normally at the end of the tube, now a little ways UP the tube and completely sideways. I tap the keyboard against my open palm a bit to see if it will fall all the way out, nope. Without thinking about the consequences, I take my spudger and insert it into the tube to try and reorient the button correctly. It does this ok and "plunk" it falls back to the bottom again.

I put in some new batteries, but you guessed it, still no power. The customer says it worked the last time they powered on the machine back in May. Ugh. I probably ended up with the button upside down so that the battery doesn't make contact. I have no other keyboard here for reference, and couldn't find an image that shows the correct orientation of the button. I've tried to turn it around, but it is now solidly locked in place at the bottom. I think I just bought a keyboard. :-(

Could someone who has one of these take a look and compare theirs to this picture to see if it's right or not?

Thanks!

The saga continues, but I'll post a separate thread about that.

 

[altrenda]

Flip the keyboard over and on the silver part under where the batteries go is a little diagram showing how the batteries go in.

There are only 2 of them. Yours looks like mine, if you look down the tube there is a silver button in the middle of a white ring at the bottom.

Forget about this keyboard, just use a regular USB keyboard to do your repairs.

 

[Digital Sage]

Strange. Every single keyboard i've seen that comes with an Apple iMac takes 2x AA batteries. They could have changed that, and i've not seen one in the field, but that's what you should be working with. 2 x AA Batteries, that slide right in, positive (button end) first. You might be looking at the end internal contact.

Also, you have to hold down the keyboard on/off button for about 5 seconds, and then make sure it's enabled in the bluetooth preferences via system preferences.

 

[HCHTech]

There are only 2 of them

There are definitely three. I am using a usb keyboard to do the time machine restore. It's got about 12 hours to go, so I'll post back with more details on the keyboard issue tomorrow. i have that button as well, but the keyboard definitely does not turn on. Once I get the Mac running again I'll try to sync it up, but I'm not hopeful.

 

[altrenda]

OK you piqued my interest. I had forgotten that the original aluminum wireless keyboard, 2007 2nd generation model, used 3 batteries, and the one they sell now, 2009 3rd generation uses 2.

As with all things Apple, they have their own Wikipedia page. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Wireless_Keyboard

my experience with Apple Aluminum keyboards are that they are fragile, and break easily. I have at least 10 of the wireless and wired in my boneyard.

Might be time for a new keyboard. The wireless sells for $69., but there are other bluetooth keyboards that work as well.

 

[Digital Sage]

OK you piqued my interest. I had forgotten that the original aluminum wireless keyboard, 2007 2nd generation model, used 3 batteries, and the one they sell now, 2009 3rd generation uses 2.

Well there you go! Learn something new everyday

 

[HCHTech]

Yeah - The iMac is newer than that - I wonder if they just brought an old keyboard because they thought I needed one. I'm going to stick with "it never worked in my possession" and not get too worked up about it.

No surprise, but I was unable to restore the newer Time Machine backup. The older one from 12/14 worked, and I was able to copy most newer files from my clone of the failing disk - so good result in the end.

What a pain to work on, though with no stand. I had the thing propped up on my bench, sitting on blocks of wood so not to block the air intakes on the bottom. Yikes!

 

[Markverhyden]

Not having a base would be a royal pain in the rear. I've got a customer that wants me to mount his iMac on a VESA arm at a standup desk. I'm going to make sure the base does not get "lost"

 

[Digital Sage]

Sounds like a nightmare job - and yeah, for the keyboard just say 'this old keyboard isn't working' and mention that its' from 2007(ish)

Good to hear you got it sorted.