iMac Freezing

Had the exact problems mentioned here horizontal lines/ artifacts on the screen and the machine would constantly crash. Had a little bit of improvement by installing SMC fan control. Happened around the update of 10.5.2, although the machine was prone to crash even during tiger. I believe the problem was always there and finally manifested itself graphically during the leopard update. It is a late model 2006 20" Imac purchased in October of 2006. took it to the Apple Store in the Palisades mall in Nyack NY. They diagnosed the problem to a defective logic board and I was quoted $964.70 for the repair, I don't have applecare so this really *****. Apple needs to step up and take care of their loyal customers, I've always had great performance with all of my apple products dating back the last 10 years and never needed applecare. I'm thinking about switching back to a PC I can get 2 of them for the price of the logic board. This coming from a former die hard apple supporter!

Add me to this list also. I am running a 2.16 ghz early 2007 24'' iMac and this is very annoying,smc doesn't help the problem.

Message was edited by: vince bennett

Hello,

I am new to MAC and to my surprise I have found out that MACs DO Crash opposite to all the TV commercials!! (It is not just the blue screen on death with windows, but the beach ball of death)

I have experienced the same issue and I had even scheduled an appointment with the genius at the Apple Store for today, but after a lot of troubleshooting, it seems like my IMAC is more stable.

I followed all the suggestions on this and other blogs (hardware tests, safe boots, etc), but the one that has seemed to work well is modifying the FAN speeds using FAN Control. I changed the default speeds to 1000 rpms (CPU, CD and HD) and after doing that, I have not seen the problem. I agree that the issue is for sure related to heat, specially on the GPU diode, but the key I guess is to have it controlled along with the main GPU and the CPU temperatures (controlling the FAN speeds for all). I have tried all day to break it and so far the problem seems to be gone. (I cancelled my appointment with the "genius").

I obviously do not have Apple care and I do not want to pay 900+ for repairing the graphics cards (and I don't think I have to, since all my hardware seems to be OK after running the hardware test), specially after being a windows geek for a long time, but after learning a lot of troubleshooting with MACs, I hope to have this one resolved until Apple sends out a fix given that so many people are experiencing this, and we should not have to be tweaking the fan speeds.

I agree that Apple needs to stop trying to be cool, and get the act together and fix these issues to really begin to get more market share.

Thanks,

I have smc going with ODD at 2018, HDD 2942 and CPU at 2744. and I'm still running at about 99F

I've been mac loyal since 2002 and all I've gotten are bum machines. both ipods have failed on me, the tibook my dad had fell apart, my g4 imac had a bad logic board and screen connection. They still can't come out and address a problem that isn't just an isolated incident?

wow - how weird is that. Me too, the horizontal line thing was really strange.

I had an imac white screen of death ages ago - got the logic board replace... Artifact still there. Upgraded to leopard and now I haven't noticed any problem at all.

Good luck

I'll add my name to this. I have a early 06 20" that is clearly out of warranty. This graphics fracturing started about year ago and is getting so bad that the computer locks up with minutes of being started. At first it only happened in games and other graphically intense programs (i'm a student who primarily works with Maya, so this is a problem.) Of course, now everything is effected. Is the only solution on an early 06 imac to replace one disfunctional component by replacing the entire logic board? Can an able technician simply replace the heatsink or some other helpful way of cooling the GPU?

Oh and I do have smcfancontrol going nearly full bore with 4500rpm. Temp right now for GPU diode is 46C. It doesn't help that i dont have air conditioning and local temps have been in the upper 90Fs...oh boy

wow that is pretty ridiculous, but not as much as apple not addressing this problem. I've had to keep the fan at 3100, and even when I only have a single page open on safari (only app open) I'm still at 96+. I've had a freeze moving the cursor through textedit. come on, that's too much. should I think about putting a fan near my computer in the mean time? I need my computer so I can't go without it until I go out of town, and I'm not sure how much time replacing a logic board will take. I have applecare though.

Well, you can put me on the list too.
I thought the problem was fixed after the freezing-fix-update this winter, but now it starts to appear again.

I'm running tiger on an Imac Intel Core 2 Duo.
Can't stand it apple isn't picking up this issue!

My question to people who got their graphic cards replaced: what did they put in.

If other people suffering from the same issue are reading this: please make sure your on this list!

Hello everyone.

I had the exact same problem, and it was fixed after Apple replaced the logic board (motherboard) on my 24" iMac 2,16 (the very first 24" iMac).

It started last year with the exact same issues already discussed here as well as in http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1441391&tstart=0 . Back when I bought it, I went to the Apple retailer store to ask about heating problems, as I thought my machine wasn't operating the fans correctly. They told me they knew of no problems of this kind, so I didn't do much about it after that.

About 6 months of World of Warcraft, iMovie, Photoshop, Youtube, Garageband, web browsing, word processing, iTunes playing, sometimes some of these all at the same time, my computer started to freeze once a day, then twice, 3, 4 times, and graphic tearing started showing up, first in WOW, then all over the screen. After some extensive reading here on these very same forums, I realized my logic board, being constantly subject to +80º C temperatures, simply started to fry up. One day, my iMac simply did not boot up at all.

Now its working flawlessly but again, temperatures get to over 70º, sometimes 80º, and the fans don't go anywhere higher than 600-1000 RPM; I monitor temperatures with Temperature Monitor (free app) and use smcFanControl (also a free app) and manually turn up the ventilation when I'm using Warcraft (5 hours a day). No issues so far.

The temperature on both processors, the GPU diode and specially in the power supply position is messed up, I believe by faulty controllers that don't manage the fans properly, leading to hardware malfunctions. Sadly, I have to say Apple, after turning to intel, has lost most of its reliability in hardware. My former iMac G4 never had any problems for 2 years (used Warcraft III there as well, and iMovie)

Anyone with these issues, if your computer started freezing up and showing graphical corruption, its most likely a logic board slowly dying. Take it in for repairs as soon as possible.

Man am I glad I found this thread. I'd posted a couple of messages but got no replies so I thought I was the only one having this problem.

http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1523409&tstart=0

For me it almost always starts with a flash video from YouTube or similar, but sometimes happens in Quicktime as well.

I've done a complete reinstall of the system too. It has only been a problem since 10.5.1 or .2, not sure which. Up until then everything was fine.

I've a 24" iMac which is about 18 months old and it's happening so often now I'm at the point of just junking it and buying a new one - but some of the messages are scaring me. People are having this issue with new models just atfer buying them?!

I can't send it away to be repaired, I have to work every day with my computer. This really is very frustrating.

Here's one more for the chopping block.....

I bought this thing 18 months ago also - I started having these problems the very week after my warranty expired. I thought my hard drive was just too full so i reformatted and loaded leopard on. Didn't solve the problem. I loaded SMC fan control on after readying countless threads on here, it helped, but now a couple months later its getting worse again..

I talked my work into buying a mac, also my mother in law and a few friends into switching to mac.... after this, how am I supposed to be able to EVER recommend a mac again......? ESPECIALLY when they aren't doing anything to fix this obviously rampant problem.

RECALL!! APPLE!!! DO A RECALL PLEASE! It's sad I invested $2500 into this machine only to see it starting to die less than 2 years later. An investment of that size should last years and years. I look at my wife next to me playing WoW on my old "piece of crap" home made $600 4 year old PC and it's running like a champ... Right now she's almost got me talked into going to best buy to buy a PC...

well?? did I make a bad move by switching to mac??????........ give me a break... I'm calling apple right now to see if they'll level with me, there's no way in the bottomless fire pit of ... you know.. that I'm forking out $900 for repairs on a machine that's gone bad so soon.

Add me to the list. I asked Apple of exchange program - no way, no exceptions 😟
Sorry to say, but it WAS my last Mac.

Marek
Macuser since Mac II si

SO WHERE IS APPLE WITH THE ANSWEARS!!!!!!!!!!!

??????????????????????????????????????????????????????????.

It appears that the problems with the NVidia 7300GT stand as a precursor to similar issues with their later mobile 8xxx series:

http://www.macrumors.com/2008/07/03/nvidia-reports-gpu-failures-in-significant-q uantities-of-laptops/

My hope is that NVidia will not overlook the 7300 series when it sets out to fix more recent portables.

Mine had video / heat problems too and here's the latest:
Called in for service and found out you have to make an appointment to talk to someone. On a second call found out I could drop my machine off which I did Monday afternoon. My basic description indicated a hardware problem and the heat issue.

Wednesday I got a call that it had been repaired! Expecting them to have not done anything or one of the resets I was shocked when they had replaced. the Nvidia card. I have apple care so it was free but my receipt showed the card at $171.88 and $135.00 for "Hardware Repair Level 2" both of which seem grossly exaggerated.

But my problem still exists!!!!!! They left my smcFanControl set flat and when I did a little surfing and then fired up my game before I realized it I was at 131 degrees! So this is clearly not a video card issue but the vid card repair did fix all the choppy video.

I'll keep ya posted.