For some time, I’ve been having problems with the power adapter for my iBook. Power would be interrupted depending on how the adapter was sitting.
It’s one of the small square blocks and thus has a removable cord leading from the house outlet to the block itself. It is this cord that has gone bad. Thinking it shouldn’t be a problem to replace, I checked but couldn’t find one. I even called the Applestore.

Only after calling Apple service was I able to find out that the cord is indeed available. All I would need to do was first pay $50 for the service request and $40 for the cord. Nice, especially considering a new adapter costs $80.

The only saving grace is that the block has retractable prongs as an alternative to the cord so I’m not left without power. It’s just half as long and needs to hog an entire outlet. Ultimately it’s just annoying to not be able to buy what should be a $5 cord for less than $90.

-Dan

I have a korg keyboard that had that problem.  Of course they wanted 10x what it costs.  I fixed the cord myself using my dremel to cut the box part of the cord open.  It was just a matter of refastening the cord inside the box.  I suggest you try to fix it yourself. 

Hope that helps

-iswitcher-

I had that problem with a Yoyo adapter for a Pismo PowerBook. I lost the origibal cable and Apple used such a weird plug on the adapter site that no ordinary cable would fit. So I bought a plug and 4’ of cable and made one myself. I had one side into the plug and the other side weas stripped and connected to the pins of the 240V side of the adapter. All held together with duct tape. Worked like a charm.

There has been quite allot of posts here lately about poor Apple service. Has anyone had a good experience? How common is this shoddy service?

I suppose I should have worded my post better. This is actually more policy than service. The service person was courteous and I didn’t have to wait very long.
I just find it ridiculous that I would have to pay $90 for someone to walk over to a bin, throw a cheap cord in a box and sent it to me. THAT is a bad policy.

-Dan

The Other Side

I’m not so worried about the outlet-to-block cord as I as the block-to-iBook cord. I wrap and unwrap that puppy about 2-3 times a day and it is developing “bumps”. If it breaks I think I can fix it along the lines of hoytt’s solution.