This afternoon I turned on my MacBook and saw this frightening icon showing that my battery (although right where it was supposed to be) was not recognized by my computer. My mind immediately jumped to the worst as we have all heard the stories of problems with Apple Batteries recently. In particular, there are reports of MacBook and MacBook Pro batteries, while not dangerous, failing and occasionally causing damage to the computer that requires more than a mere battery replacement. In fact, my friend Melinda, has been plagued by battery issues on her own MacBook which means that until she can get the problem corrected she must operate her laptop while plugged into a power outlet or it immediately shuts down. This of course negates many of the advantage of having a portable computer!

I shut down my MacBook and flipped it over and when I pressed the status light on my battery I was relieved to see that three bright green lights lit up, telling me that my battery had a partial charge (not surprisingly, I had been using it all morning). Next, I removed the battery and noticed that a small screw in the battery compartment that held the piece of metal that covered the RAM bay had somehow become loose. The screw was sticking out quite a bit and the metal cover was bulging out. I popped the screw back into place and all was once again well with my battery. It could be a fluke, it could be my battery had just become jostled and removing it and reinserting it popped it back into place, or it could be that the bowing metal cover and/or screw out of place kept my battery from making proper contact. Either way, I'm pleased to say that I have been working on my computer for the last few days with no battery problems since.