Ask The Mac Techie

[Linzi]

Hey Mate.

Ok To answers your questions.
1. If you have alot of RAM in the machine, it WILL use it to help increase the speed. At the moment i have only this page open in safari, its currently using 2.5GB of my 4GB. Yet mine also shows 93MB Free lol You have t remember iPhoto uses a massive amount of ram to help show the previews all all your photos. How often do you restart your machine ? it should be done every few days cause other wise memory will continue to be full. If you have free RAM, the machine will use that more appose to virtual memory using the hard drive. Make sure all your software & firmware is up to date

2. The Trackpad clicker is very common, replace several trackpad a week. You could remove the bottom plate, but there are special TriLobe or Pentalobe Screws to remove the battery, to gain access to the trackpad adjustment clicking screw thats a T6. JB hifi wont be able to repair the machine, they will tell you to go to a apple repair centre. You could call apple, and see what support they can offer, if the machine is less then 1 year old you will have warranty to cover the trackpad not clicking.

3. DO NOT MANUALLY control the fans, the machine is designed to cool its self. Note that they are no longer "Laptops" BUT notebooks, for the simple fact that the amount of grunt and heat they generate and you cannot handle them being on your lap doing extreme tasks. The CPUs get hot, its what they do, its not uncommon to have the CPU at 110°

Hope that helps a little.

Hey, Thanks for your quick reply.
1. Okay, that sounds about right, and I have noticed it about iPhoto.. Also to be honest I don't fully shutdown my computer as often as I probably should.

2. I probably could do it myself, but as long as it is still under warranty, I might as well take it in and get them to fix it instead of risking it myself. Should I put the old ram back in just to make sure? because I have heard of them blaming the ram and therefore not giving the appropriate warranty.

3. Okay, so dont have it on my lap when playing games, or processor hungry apps..? And if i can start the fans early and prevent it getting to 90° or 100°, why shouldn't I? Because when i do play games and start the fan early, it hardly goes over 80°, and to be honest I'm not real keen on letting it reach 110° lol.

Thanks for your help, makes me feel a bit better about it all. lol

 

[Astranomical]

Its unlikely they'd blame the RAM, but if I were returning any machine for repair under warranty, I'd replace anything I upgraded (RAM, HDD, etc) with the parts that originally shipped with the machine.

 

[edals]

Its unlikely they'd blame the RAM, but if I were returning any machine for repair under warranty, I'd replace anything I upgraded (RAM, HDD, etc) with the parts that originally shipped with the machine.

It Does not matter about the RAM or hard drive upgrade with apple, the only thing is if we find a fault with the 3rd party hardware, we tell you thats the part at fault, and then charged a diagnostic fee as its not covered by apple. Hard drives and ram are user serviceable depending on the machine. But if you have found issues have risen after you installed the new ram then id install the ram that was shipped with your machine.

 

[edals]

Hey, Thanks for your quick reply.
1. Okay, that sounds about right, and I have noticed it about iPhoto.. Also to be honest I don't fully shutdown my computer as often as I probably should.

2. I probably could do it myself, but as long as it is still under warranty, I might as well take it in and get them to fix it instead of risking it myself. Should I put the old ram back in just to make sure? because I have heard of them blaming the ram and therefore not giving the appropriate warranty.

3. Okay, so dont have it on my lap when playing games, or processor hungry apps..? And if i can start the fans early and prevent it getting to 90° or 100°, why shouldn't I? Because when i do play games and start the fan early, it hardly goes over 80°, and to be honest I'm not real keen on letting it reach 110° lol.

Thanks for your help, makes me feel a bit better about it all. lol

No worries mate. As for the Fans, the machine is designed to cool its self when it needs and is controlled by the hardware and you can cause issues when your over riding what the hardware wants to do, and there is no need to worry about it running hot, they have sensors that will put the machine to sleep if the machine gets to hot. so no you wont kill the machine.

 

[Linzi]

No worries mate. As for the Fans, the machine is designed to cool its self when it needs and is controlled by the hardware and you can cause issues when your over riding what the hardware wants to do, and there is no need to worry about it running hot, they have sensors that will put the machine to sleep if the machine gets to hot. so no you wont kill the machine.

Ok that makes sense about the fans and everything, thanks.

Also, another question whilst i think of it. Just with cleaning, I took my battery cover off just to have a look, and it's fairly dusty in there. I want to get a can of compressed air and just go at it with that, is that the right way to go about it? And should i disconnect the fans and take them off to get under them or anything ? Any tips on just cleaning and getting the dust out of any nooks and crannies?

 

[edals]

Ok that makes sense about the fans and everything, thanks.

Also, another question whilst i think of it. Just with cleaning, I took my battery cover off just to have a look, and it's fairly dusty in there. I want to get a can of compressed air and just go at it with that, is that the right way to go about it? And should i disconnect the fans and take them off to get under them or anything ? Any tips on just cleaning and getting the dust out of any nooks and crannies?

Yep compressed air is the way mate, and yes remove the fans, they will be a T6, dust gets against the heat sink fins and clogs them right up.

 

[maginoodle]

Just wondering if you know of way to recover photos from a ipad 3? It hasn't been hooked to a comp since the pics were taken and i have never hooked it to a comp myself. The only time it may have been hooked to a comp was when my company first bought it, it now has a sim and doesn't need to be hooked up for updates etc.
I have stopped using it so that they aren't over written. I only have xp to run software on.
I tried wondershare but it wont/cant see the ipad when it hooked up.

Any help appreciated

Cheers Shane

 

[edals]

Hey Mate. Unfortunately Due to them being a iPad and using SSD storage they are gone. i have done many attempts with $1000s worth of software and never had any luck, Even pro guys I send drives to in Brisbane cannot do it at this stage.

 

[maginoodle]

Thanks mate, i have been searching google and it seems that you can get them if you have previously had the ipad connected to the comp you are trying to get the stuff back with. because i hadent had this hooked up before the program wont recognise it as a drive.

Cheers Shane

 

[Linzi]

Hey, me again, I've got a bigger problem this time..
I was watching a movie with my late 2011 high macbook pro plugged in to my TV sitting on the floor. I paused the movie and left the laptop sitting there for a few hours whilst I went and worked on my car. Come back to find it completely dead, nothing, the battery indicator didn't light up either. It was plugged into the charger this whole time, so I thought maybe the charger had shat itself, looked closer at the LED indicator on the magsafe and saw that it was flashing a VERY faint green, and every now and then orange. Its now just a solid faint green. Today I borrowed a mates charger, only to find the same thing The worst part is that this happened a year TO THE DAY after I bought it, and of course I didnt get apple care, so my warranty ran out on that day (yesterday). I rang JB Hifi when I thought it was just the charger, and they said they would swap the charger over as long as its not too far f. But now it could be worse I'm hoping theyll still be abole to help me lol. Please don't tell me it's the logic board, liek I've been reading