820-00164-A (SMC EATER) Evil Board

I ran across a board that wasted a lot of my time. Thought I would share..

No light on the charger, Power supply showed 100 mA current draw. "red flag" So I immediately thought a problem in the PP3V42 supply or a bad SMC. or some liquid damage somewhere. I performed a through inspection for water damage and found none. With 100mA current draw I (assumed) the PP3v42 was probably ok. Like a idiot I grabbed my thermal not my volt meter to take a look. In the past when I see strange stuff like this from the PS I always find it with the thermal. 100mA is quite a bit of current for this stage in the game. I powered up the FLIR and the SMC was a bright hot spot. I was in a hurry and was was behind for the day. I looked up and asked God why did you give me a bad SMC? I hate SMC's. I looked up at the clock and said... Lets see how fast I can swap this puppy out. I Reballed a doner and it took me 20 minutes. I had to reball it twice because the first time I screwed up and bumped the balls when I was reflowing them to center! I am getting faster at these but they still suck. I have seen the SMC fail before like this and have fixed multiple boards by replacing it. It is not common but it happens. After the SMC was on I did a quick bump with the MagSafe watching the power supply and noticed a instant jump to 300mA and no green light. I quickly pulled the MagSafe. I have noticed when using a power supply the green light is almost instant no waiting like a charger. I said "crap that's not good". 300mA is the wrong direction for no green light. I Grabbed my thermal again did a quick power bump and all kinds of stuff light up. (Keep in mind I have yet to take a volt meter to this board. I am a IDIOT). So looking at the board view I notice that they all had the PP3V42 rail in common. So now...... I grab my volt meter and while measuring PP3V42 I did a quick bump with the MagSafe I saw 7V flash up and I instantly yanked the MagSafe. No smoke but holy crap. 7V is way wong! I Isolated the PP3V42 PS and it was putting out 17 volts! I did fix the supply by replacing U7090 but it had already done it's damage. After the repair to the supply the output was normal 3.4v but still no green light. I replaced the SMC again and nope. I did not see any other shorts by measuring or on thermal but I decided to give up on this board anyway. I could spend all kinds of time chasing this carnage.

Well I guess that is how I learn. The hard way.
Had I saw this voltage first I would of walked away while I had the chance! At least I got some SMC practice in.

Just thought I would share my mistake with everyone.

Cheers.

I marked the board as PP3V42 Surge so I don't grab the wrong parts of it as as donor. I almost don't want to keep it around. I can see it still wasting my time.
 
Last edited:

2informaticos

Administrator
Staff member
7V at 3v42_G3H is many times result of bad solders, or corrosion at R7095/96.

ALWAYS use voltmeter and diode scale for first tests.
In fact, do NOT apply power on the board BEFORE checking diode mode on all basic points; like 3V42, PPBUS and big coils from secondary supplies.

I also recommend you to use solder paste for reballing SMC, instead of damned balls...
 

JohnB8812

New member
If that ever happens, you have to replace every single chip connected to 3v42 meaning U7090, SMC, U5110, U1950, U1900 etc. It's a PITA, but it can be done.
 
Top