Chosen Solution
This is related to the power adapter breaking off int the DC in port. The toothpick thing didn’t work for me, but I did the step by step repair, replaced the part with one from iFixit. New adapter charges the battery just fine, but now my hard drive is acting weird. Booted up once in 20 tries. Got ? folder other times. Tiger install DVD using System Profiler sees something on the ATA sometimes, but no drive size or anything. Disk Utility doesn’t show the hard drive to erase or repair. Any ideas what I messed up?
First thing I always recommend is checking the cables. Make sure there are no loose connections. After that it could be a damaged hard drive cable or hard drive.
The 1.33 12" iBook G4 (like the 1.42 14") doesn’t have a hard drive cable. It’s only a male bracket that clips in a female socket fixed to the logic board. You need to apply a little force (with the flat side of a spudger) when inserting the HD bracket in the logic board socket and make sure to reinstall the grey plastic stopper that will keep a secure connection. Double check your HD installation.
THanks for all the help! It did turn out to be a loose connection. I didn’t have to open the top of the computer. It was on the part of the board by the hard drive, but on the bottom of the laptop that I had open for the DC in adapter. I’m attaching an image in case anyone else has the same problem.
