macbook air black screen and making restarting sound every 15 seconds

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macbook air black screen and making restarting sound every 15 seconds

My (2018-19) mac book air battery died last night. I plugged it in this morning, but the screen would not come on. The apple logo was coming on and going off almost immediately. Then, after awhile I noticed it was coming on and off slowly. I watched some videos and tried the reset methods, but nothing has worked.

Unfortunately, I don't have the tools needed to unscrew the back or an external screen. I've tried different cables, tried cleaning the port, etc.

Without touching anything, the computer is making the start up sound every 15 seconds. I can see there is a bit of light (dark purplish) when it makes the sound, but nothing else happens. I've checked the brightness also.

I've noticed in the past few months that the computer goes through periods of making a lot of noise (like it's working really hard and tends to die quickly if not plugged in.

I'm not sure if there is anything else to try at this point. Maybe I just need to go purchase the tools and try removing the battery.

MacBook Air 13″, macOS 14.6

Posted on Sep 29, 2025 5:25 AM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

HWTech

Level 9

68,612 points

Sep 29, 2025 7:33 PM in response to help-me-ronda

FYI, the battery is attached by multiple adhesive strips so removing it is not as easy as it sounds especially since the speakers need to be removed and are also attached with adhesive strips which tend to break when attempting to remove the strips.

Disconnecting the battery from the Logic Board may allow you to power on the laptop, but it still probably won't boot (no need to physically remove it). When a 2016-2020 Intel Apple laptop with USB-C ports does not have a battery connected......booting can be extremely slow. Extremely slow means it may take an hour or even all day to boot (personal first hand experience), plus the fan will run at high speed since the battery's thermal sensor will not be visible to the system.

About the only thing I can suggest is the following:

SMC Reset (the procedure has changed for the T2 Macs)
PRAM Reset (hold for two chimes if possible)
Perform a DFU Firmware Revive. Or better yet a DFU Firmware Restore although the latter destroys all data on the internal SSD & requires using Internet Recovery Mode to reinstall macOS.

If none of these suggestions work, then personally I would give up on this laptop since it is not worth spending any more time & money on any of these Intel USB-C Macs for multiple reasons. The money spent on repairs is better put towards a new laptop. The 2018-2020 MBAirs with T2 chip don't have a good track record with their Logic Boards.

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