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The April 2014 update of Apple's 13" MacBook Air features refreshed dual-core i5 and i7 processors, plus slightly increased battery performance.

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My MacBook Air lives after liquid damage but runs slow. What to do?

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About 2 weeks ago, I spilled a small amount of juice on my MacBook Air (A1496) while it was on. I turned it off after whipping the keyboard off and turned it upside, letting it dry out for 2 days.

When I tried to cut it back on, it came on fine and I could log in as usual. The only thing was when I got to the desktop, the keyboard and trackpad were totally unresponsive.

I then connected an external keyboard and mouse to navigate through to see if there were other problems.

The system ran slow. I then took it to Apple and they erased my hard drive and system reset my Mac but the keyboard and trackpad still weren’t responsive.

They opened it up and said that there was liquid damage to my battery and needed to run a diagnostic for $700 (Basically for giving me a new motherboard)

I then went home, opened up my system and cleaned it with alcohol letting it dry out for 4 days.

I turned it on today learning that I did something right because my keyboard is back responsive. The only thing is that it still runs slow and the trackpad is unresponsive.

Now I’m thinking that I should order a new battery and trackpad cable. Will that fix my problem?

Answered! View the answer I have this problem too

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Don't waste your $$$ on a battery, until the juice (grape or orange ?) problem is fixed.

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My MacBook Air was running slow after water damage, and the culprit was the root_kernel. Wiped the drive and installed Ubuntu and now it runs fine.

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You likely need to replace the trackpad and the cable may also need replacing to fix it.

As to why your system is slow has to do with sensors on your logic board which is telling SMC your system is overheating, which of course it's not. Lets see if its a temp sensor thats misbehaving. Download this app: TG Pro. Paste a screenshot of the main window here for us to se. Do make sure you've exposed all of the sensors in the image. Adding images to an existing question

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Ok. I’m about to do it now.

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I have added the screenshot of the application. What do I do next ?

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Well, it looks like your voltage monitoring is off. Sorry to say this is going to need deeper logic board repair. Thats why your fan is in over drive and the CPU is in safe mode (running at a reduced clock rate).

At least the good news is the thermal sensors are all working.

Louis Rossmann has a bunch of YouTubes. I can't remember the exact vid he did one about a month ago that got into this exact issue.

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Ahhhh. I’m not the computer tech type so I don’t believe I would be able to repair a logic board myself. So how much would this repair cost me from a third party tech ?

Basically what do you suggest I do?

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You'll need to find someone who has micro soldering skills and access to the needed parts.

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Most likely, one of the juicy keys is stuck ON. Do you hear odd sounds as the keyboard buffer fills?

Is the mouse erratic ?

You must dis-connect the internal keyboard to test it.

Was the touch-pad juiced ?

Same answer applies , but there is bad news,,, most touch-pads are 'capacitive', when they wet, they die.

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The only thing that I hear is the fan. I disconnected and reconnected the trackpad cable and it is still not moving at all BUT I can click. I just can’t navigate the trackpad.

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Yes it was and I whipped it off too

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Try this: Move the cursor to screen center, tap the power off button.

Don't touch your mouse !

Its expected to go dark, then a long pause, and wake-up exactly where you left it, with the cursor in the same position.

If not, the juice has 'changed' the touch capacitors. <-- bad explanation. sic

Why did you mention the cable ? Whats wrong with it ?

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Nothing is wrong with the cables, I just thought that replacing them would matter. And it didn’t work. I may just order a new trackpad or just use a Bluetooth one.

I still need to fix how slow it is running! You think a new battery will fix that issue?

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No, it will not make it any faster, but the repair guy can make his BMW payment ! Take the battery out, run without it, is it faster ?

I vote to un-plug the keyboard & touch-pad & battery, then use it for a few days. What if Mr.BMW is correct ? Horrors !!!

Its still going to run slow

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First try and run ASD and see if you have a specific sensor issue. First things to disconnect would be the webcam connector FIRST to see if the issues go away, and THEN try no battery. After that, if ASD doesn't report issues, you very likely may have corrosion under the SMC on the board causing high fan speed and would require logic board repair. Check out the place in my bio for any help with that :)

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Also you want to inspect the trackpad flex cable on BOTH sides for any corrosion as well as the trackpad itself as it can cause sensor failure as well.

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Where can I go to find a link to a trusted ASD?

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If the bad-trackpad is still cabled, would it skew the sensor readings ?

We are waiting to see sensor-status-tests.

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Yes the trackpad sensor is the Palm Rest sensor and it will cause many weird things.

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Hi,

Even I am having the same issue, and this was the most helpful post I could find online. Liquid was spilled on my MacBook Air A1466 (128GB SSD 8GB RAM). Liquid was all over the motherboard which I got cleaned (repaired) and my dead MacBook came to life. It is, but, now very very slow. I don’t know what to do now. Here’s a screenshot of TG Pro

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Kindly help! Thanks in advance.

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Stephon will be eternally grateful.
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