One of the two cables might have broken off of the pcb inside the main housing of the power adapter. The cables have crimped ends which can break due to cable-movement, causing erratic loading/not loading although the light is constantly on.

One of the two cables might have broken off of the pcb inside the main housing of the power adapter. The cables have crimped ends which can break due to cable-movement, causing erratic loading/not loading although the light is constantly on.

Problem solved today ! .. after months of seeking a solution. I thought, I´d give it another try with installing systems onto an external volume attached to the mac. Lion - didn´t work - installation stalled about 6 times. Snow leopard - wouldn´t even boot from the installer DVD - tried about 5 times. As you can see, i just tried and tried again, without being able to get a newer system than 10.4.11 installed (i haven´t gotten to leopard yet..). But - here it comes : Speakers are back to normal ! And nothing has changed, really .. I didn´t have to mess with my running system or hardware. (Black Macbook 2,1 Core 2 Duo 2.0)

I completely took apart the ODD-fan on a 2266 i bought just yesterday with the same problem. 1. there was a tiny piece of plastic caught inside the motor-mechanism - probably causing the noise. More importantly though: There was a massive build-up of rust-dust on both bearings (3x8x4mm), probably originating from the wear of the pin they´re sitting on. ..cleaned it up, gave the pin a little grease, put a spacer between the two bearings (ca 0.5mm) to compensate the weak spring (watch for proper turning-function). Sounds fine now - hope it will last.

I have the same Macbook with the same problem. Booted in windows all speakers work fine ! Booted with fresh original system-installs 10.4.3 thru 10.4.11 on a firewire-volume only the center-speaker works. I´ve tried fixing smc-firmware, but with a working firmware checkout it won´t install. This is the first post I´ve found on the subject.

last comment ps. :

no need to disassemble completely with last described method !

simply remove the back cover and the headphone side speaker module, disconnect the battery ribbon on the camera side, remove / pry / pull out the metal hinge clip on the headphone side and you´re set for swapping the battery. If you´re used to soldering - simply buy two ICR18650 cells with a good amperage with u-soldering tags (can be cut with a good pair of scissors), confection to originals - and replace.

Sorry to tell you :

prying the battery compartment off with a spudger is the wrong disassembly move and you will very likely damage the fragile construction.

The correct way to go is to remove the speaker modules as shown and then pry / pull out the metal hinge clip on the headphone side. Once it´s out, the battery compartment can be swivelled out on that side with great ease. Assembly later works a treat. No damage done.