My iPad won't charge - what can I do?

Got questions? Go ahead: Ask me anything!

Anonymous asks:

I have an old iPad that we use infrequently. I forgot about it for quite a while and now it is dead - won't turn on. I hooked up the charger but it doesn't charge. Can anybody fix these things?

It's possible you just haven't been patient enough. When an iPhone or iPad is thoroughly out of juice, it won't even put that charging icon on the screen for quite a while. I know this because my wife has done that to both her iPhone and her iPad. It was about an hour before her iPhone showed any signs of life, but it did charge normally after that.

By the way, the batteries don't like that. They prefer to be recharged when they are just down a bit. Try not to do that!

If it just seems dead but shouldn't be, try holding both the power button and the Home button for 30 seconds or so - that has been reported as a cure.

As to repair, if it comes to that, maybe, but not likely. These things are not designed to be repairable.

On the other hand, check with Apple. They apparently will replace it outright for $99.00. That page says "All iPad models". They do the same thing for iPhones for $20 less and again it says "All iPhone models"!