The other night while using my MBP, I had the screen flash briefly and then die... I'm assuming/hoping that it is just the inverter, as it's cheaper...and the screen is still visible when I hold a flashlight directly up to it. The backlight also flickers brightly a couple times each time the computer turns on.

In another (possibly completely unrelated) issue, I just finished moving, and hooked the MBP back up to my stereo using the optical out. Audio is fine when playing over laptop speakers or normal 1/8th" jack, but when using optical, it becomes choppy and stutters.

I rebooted into Windows and the issue shows up there, so it isn't the Quicktime 7.3.1 update like I'd been hoping... is there some other update that could be blamed, or could it possibly be related to my display issue?

Thanks!
John

Good and bad news. The good news, the display issue does sound like just the inverter blowing, so that is probably all you need to replace.

The bad news, I can't see how it could be possibly related to the sound issue. Besides trying a different cable, about all I can think of it being is the Magsafe board.

Thanks. I guess I'll give a new cable a whirl and then hope that something starts working again once I install the inverter.

Me again... so, the inverter worked great. I switched over to just using a mini instead of optical out, so I ignored the audio problem for a while. The past couple weeks, however, I've had an issue with finder crashing and not relaunching, and I think I've isolated it to the eSATA expresscard I've been using - it no longer stays in when I push it into the port.

Do you think I need to fully replace the card, or could there be some adjustment I could make within the case? Or am I way off base and it won't solve anything?
Thanks for your help.

That is hard to say. You would probably need to open up the machine and check the slot and see if it is damaged inside or something blocking it.

We don't carry the card slot itself on our site, but we should be able to special order it from Apple if needed.

Thanks. I ordered the magsafe/etc board before I saw your post, and it just arrived. It doesn't appear that it has any bearing on the "locking" of a card into the slot, so I probably need to replace the cage, as well? How much does one of those run?

Nevermind - everything is working great!