Beeping when I turn it on

DaveCooke

I got a white MacBook and when I power it on, I get a loud beeping sound. Is there anything I can do to make it boot up?

John

Beeping and a black screen generally indicates a memory issue. Make sure you have RAM installed. If you do, try powering on with one slot empty, and if that doesn't work, try powering on with the other slot empty. If it works with one slot empty, either you've got a bad slot or a bad RAM module, and you can use known-good RAM modules in the "bad" slot to determine if it's the RAM or the slot. Or, you can just limp along using only one slot.

Also, make sure you're using the right RAM. A1181 white MacBooks use 667MHZ and 800MHZ RAM (2009 uses 800MHZ). If you're using the wrong speed you might get the beeping sound. A1342 white unibody MacBooks use 1067MHZ RAM, and it's not uncommon to get the beeping when using 1333 or 1600MHZ RAM. In most cases you can actually uses the faster RAM in one slot as long as you use a stick of the proper speed RAM in the other in order to down-clock it.

If you are absolutely sure you're using known-good RAM (RAM you have seen working in another computer), and you are absolutely sure the speed is correct for the computer you have, then your board might have an issue, and there's not a lot to do about that besides swap the board.

Let me know how it goes!

Thanks,

John