Chosen Solution
My newest A1181 Macbook still has a display issue after replacing the inverter cable. Before replacing the cable, the computer turned on, but the display flashed quickly (less than a second) and went black. I also got a solid white power light, rather than it turning off after the display comes on like it normally would. I did, however, hear the usual startup chime. What led me to replace the inverter cable was checking the display with a flashlight and seeing the flashing folder. I checked the resistance of the individual wires on the inverter cable and determined there was a short in at least one, showing ~3 ohms. Now when I press the power button, the display flashes very quickly (a little quicker than before), but doesn’t display anything at all. Checking with a light revealed nothing. The white power light is still glowing solid still, but there is no chime. I removed the keyboard again just to check over all connections, and everything looked fine. I don’t think any wires were being pinched in the hinges, I was careful to route them as they were. RAM in installed, HDD is connected. I tried to reset PRAM, but the computer didn’t even turn off. I’m pretty sure it’s a hardware issue. But my question is… is there anything that I could have screwed up? I’m pretty sure I put everything back together right, I’ve torn down quite a few of these A1181s. I connected the inverter cable to the board as it was and reassembled. I guess it’s possible the inverter board itself is faulty, but being that I’m not getting ANY display now, I think it’s probably an issue with the logic board. Is there something I’m missing, or anything to check?
Hook it up to an external display to help narrow the diagnostics.
Hi had the same model with the same issues (I’m currently dealing with it on a new model too !) I may be incorrect here but I also replaced my inverter in-fact the whole screen assembly and it turned out the device assumed the screen was shut so upon powering it up it would instantly go black and the solid light would appear (no chime either ), the way I diagnosed this was with a display cable and then installing insomniaX (This allows you to disable the close lid sleep function) and unplugging the external display to test the internal display. It may be a far fetch but if give it a go, unfortunately although I diagnosed the issue I never found a hardware level fix other than insomniaX, I instead striped the device for parts.
