F PC

Q: About that 6970M replacement program...

Question for anyone who got the 6970M card replaced in their mid 2011 imac:

 

- Did they format your hard drive? Or if they replaced it, did they also send you back the old one?

 

I'm asking this because since yesterday, my iMac refuses to boot past about 33% of the progress bar (yosemite) followed by a white/light gray screen or a plain black screen if I try to boot on my bootcamp partition. Same thing with the installation CD, safe mode, zapping everything (like the pram), etc. The only thing that works is the single user mode. The hard drive is still fully functionnal and shouldn't require any replacement (I know there's also a replacement program for some HD but I shouldn't be affected by it since it concerns 1GB drives and mine is a 2GB). But since Apple says that some of their servicing require replacing or formatting the hard drive, I just want to know if I can send it directly or if I absolutely need to find a way to backup it if I want to keep my data.

iMac (27-inch Mid 2011)

Posted on Mar 9, 2015 9:38 AM

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Q: About that 6970M replacement program...

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  • by Allan Jones,

    Allan Jones Allan Jones Mar 9, 2015 9:56 AM in response to F PC
    Level 8 (35,306 points)
    iPad
    Mar 9, 2015 9:56 AM in response to F PC

    According to a Apple list of active Repair Extension Programs (REP), that one is not available but this document suggests it is still active, and it was last modified six days ago:

     

    iMac (27-inch): AMD Radeon 6970M Video Card Replacement Program - Apple Support

     

    Print it out before going to an Apple service provider or Apple Store. Historically, there is always some employee who did not get the word.

     

    Some iMac REPs were for a bad hard drive, but your is not. Although I doubt that the repair will do anything to your hard drive, it is IMPERATIVE that you make a backup of the drive before taking it in for any repair. They may find a hard drive problem, some electrical fault could zap your HD during service, or the store might burn down. Even if they were only going to replace the glass panel over the display, I would never let a computer out of my site for service without a full backup.

     

    When Apple replaces a defective drive, they keep the old one.

  • by baltwo,

    baltwo baltwo Mar 9, 2015 4:59 PM in response to F PC
    Level 9 (62,256 points)
    Mar 9, 2015 4:59 PM in response to F PC

    I just had my logic board and video card replaced and that didn't require mucking with the HD. However, I'm covered under the AppleCare Protection Plan and was eligible for inhouse repair. I can't believe anyone at Apple would mention an HD for a video issue, here's no good reason for anyone to deal with the HD, but if you're going to send it to an Apple repair station, the prudent thing to do is make a clone of every volume on your machine (I can't speak to the bootcamp one, since I don't do windoze). and ensure that they function like the originals.

     

    27" i7 iMac (Mid 2011) refurb, OS X Yo (10.10.2), Mavs, ML & SL, G4 450 MP w/10.5 & 9.2.2