display anomalies

Hi Reload, all,

First off let me point out that none of the things mentioned in this thread are 'fixes' or solutions... they are all patches, or work arounds that 'might' keep you failing MacBook Por (not a spelling mistake) running a little longer.

It is most certainly an engineering issue, or issues... the design and manufacturing process are poor, sub usual Apple standard...

The main failure it would seem is the ill matched ATI X1600 graphic chip that because of poor manufacturing coupled with design flaws will over heat resulting in the failure of the solder points that connect the GPU to the logicboard... this is compounded by low end thermal paste applied without quality control. This is the main display failure that produces the anomalies and eventual complete system failure.

The frustration of this is often further compounded by faulty LCDs that are not sealed correctly or a generally of low quality with dirt, dust or other foreign matter inside the LCD screens and/or uneven illumination. Not to mention, failing batteries, melting power cords, dead keys and more...

For most of us this results in the purchase of a product that falls well short of our expectations at the time of purchase. Having to install third party software not to enhance the product but to keep it running, having to disassemble the product to correct manufacturing or quality control failures, or having to turn off certain product features to prolong the eventual premature death of the product... is quite simply WRONG!

Having said that, until Apple come to the party, those of us that can't afford to spend big$s every few years on new hardware will have to pursue every avenue available to us to keep the product running...

So yes, FanControl, disable Quartz Extreme, reapply thermal paste correctly... all good band-aides, but not 'fixes'...

Another 2¢ worth from me...

John

If I might ask a dumb question, how/where do you turn off Quartz Extreme?
I've looked in all the System Preference panels and haven't seen where to do this.
Also searched the thread with no results.
Thanks

In terminal:

Turn off quartz extreme

defaults write /Library/Preferences/com.apple.windowserver GLCompositor -dict tileHeight -int 0 tileWidth -int 0

And then reboot


Turn on:

defaults delete /Library/Preferences/com.apple.windowserver GLCompositor

And then reboot

Hi there I'm trying to turn off quarts extreem I can't find it where you have said it will be, I have snow leopard is it somewhere else? thanks for your help.

John,
Generally, you're absolutely right. Apple doesn't seem to be using the best hardware out there. But if you think about it, any computer out there is likely to fall apart, that's just a matter of time.

Anyhow, I've got another tip for those who are going to tear their beloved macbook apart themselves. When you remove the fans to get the logic board out try to remove the dust that seems to be gathering between the heatsink and both fans. Good luck everyone solving their problem.

I've had the checkerboard screen happening for two years- inspired by 'reload911', I thought I would give one of his recommended hacks a try:

"The first one is to basically install FanControl and set it to 40/75 with 2500 rpm, but that's just gonna get you rid of constant lockups. Sometimes when your notebook is hot and doing some hard work it might lock up and there's nothing you can do about it. Well, actually you can..."

I had tried SMCFanControl before with no success, but I with FanControl (completely different product) I am now able to use my MBP in a limited manner: If I start up cold, it will almost always do the checkerboard thing and hang on the blue screen. I then force quit by holding power button, then reboot in safe mode. It always starts off in checkerboard, hangs a little on blue screen (sans checkerboard) but after a few minutes it will boot cleanly into safe mode. I then run permissions verify and repair, and it always comes back with the same permissions needing repair. See my log file: https://docs.google.com/leaf?id=0B1FxmJMm-iQCYmUyOTQ5YTQtM2ZhNy00ODEwLWE0ZjQtMDZ hNmVhYzlmNDk2&hl=en

Do these recurring permissions problems indicate anything to you more knowledgeable types? I am writing this now on my MBP, and will be able to use it without issues until I put it to sleep or shut it down. I don't let it sleep, and shut it down when I am done. I have been able to use Aperture, Photoshop, and Illustrator successfully, where before these apps would cause the processor to reach temps upwards of 200 deg F. Now the hottest I've seen is in the low 150's.

I'm happy to be able to use the MBP for something, but I've been round and round with Apple to no avail, and shouldn't have to even deal with this. I feel like they know this model is a problem, which was fixed with later models (my wife is about to buy a new MBP through her university, so I hope so!) and they need to own up. To make matters worse, the f,r,4, and f4 keys no longer work (I suspect they were cooked by the processor) and I have to use Keyboard Viewer to type them. Also the battery is toast, and the DVD drive is suspect. Wait- why do I bother again? Freakin' Apple!...

Oh- I forgot to add that I also turned off Quartz Extreme and this is my second logic board.

Throw me into the list. I get horizontal lines, splotches, graphics distortions and system lockups.

Here is an image of the horizontal line across the bottom part of the screen as I look at the apple defects website. Same symptoms. The system freezing has forced me to work on another computer.

http://img684.imageshack.us/img684/2647/screenshot20100424at932.png

Hi there, check out this website, get your name on the list! We need numbers to get apple to address this issue!
http://macbook-pro-issues.webs.com/apps/forums/

I have a MPB 2.16 GHZ with ATI 1600

My issue did not occur until I upgraded from Tiger to Snow Leopard. But, upon upgrade I experience but hard crashes and horizontal lines. Subsequent updates have seemed to fix the crashing problem; but the horizontal line problem still exists. I find no direct correlation with heat per se. I don't know what the problem is.

Hi, i've a macbook pro 1.1 1,83
i've the same problem

when my mac (i think the gpu) go up to 60° i see the lines on the screen and 2-3 times a day my mac freeze...and i've to shutdown by the power button...

this is very frustating...

hello all.
I have found a strange behavior, so If you can all test it, to see if you get the same results:
I use "temperature monitor" (free) to better understand the cooling and the bug.
SO, let your mac idle for 5 or 10 minutes, looking at temperature monitor History screen, with the option "short term history". you can set it with different colors for the differents sensors. Look at the memory sensor:
Now unplug the magsafe, letting the MBP running on battery :
Immediately, in an average 15 seconds, the memory sensor temperature loose 10 ° c !!!
then, all the temperature shut down, following it, which seem normal, as there is no more that heating source...
Now plug the magsafe, temperature climb immediately, followed a litlle bit after by the others sensors.
(it climb fast first, then more slower to get exactly the same °)

If you can reproduce it yourself, may be it's something to follow, because it could say that the heating culprit is the memory controller, or is related to the memory temperature.

and a question remain : why, on battery, the memory get 10 °c less hot !?!
Could it be a hardware bug, that made the memory heating when plugged ??

MBP rev1.1 1.83 ghz, 2GO ram, paired, running 10.4.11

Same thing here, but I wouldn't look there. Plus I'm not sure what this "Mem controller" really stands for. Chipset/Northbridge maybe?

If the PSU is plugged in there's probably some additional circuitry working on the logic board to distribute the additional current, or mix the current from battery/PSU. If it's situated near the mem/memcontroller then it's just heating it up.

Anyway the memory(RAM)/memcontroller is not the issue cause it doesn't effect the graphics. What you see on the screen is done in the GPU and VRAM. Those are AFAIK situated elsewhere.

Plus, forget about the memcontroller's temperature unless it's above, I don't know.. 60-65*C probably. It's 47*C in my case with PSU plugged in. Not so much after all.

I know that the bug came from the graphic card, I just try to understand why some MBP are dying, and not others.

And may be a heating source, not planned by the macbook pro designers, or may be coming from a bad composant, I don't know, or from the manufacturing bad days..
That heating for the ram is quite strange for me, because it just came from the PSU plugged . No matter the activity, it is heating a lot. If the computer is idle, after a while , all temperature sensors are the same. unplug the psu, and the memory will drop from 10° and more, if you let it unplugged (i reach 30 °). You will see that all sensors will go down, after a little time, following the memory sensor. And the opposite is true : all sensors follow the heating up of the memory sensor, after a while.
Also, the memory heat, when computer idle, is the top temperature sensor, or just under the cpu...

and 47 ° is quite warm, as a lot of memory have a 55 ° maximum temperature in specifications.

You have the same symptom . if all people here have the same symptom, it will be very easy to check and to know if people without our problems have the same symptom or not. If they don't have that symptom, so it could be the origin .
sorry for my bad english, I hope you will understand what I mean.
If we can identify a concrete reason (cause), may be Apple could listen to it.

Add me to the list, I'm having all the horizontal lines, color splashes, freezing and heat issues listed. I have loved this Mac Book Pro for four years and lobbied for Mac to every friend I know. But it looks like it is the end of the road. I am disappointed that while under Mac warranty I came to the mac store with the same problems I have now (just not as bad) and the "geniuses" were unable to diagnose the problem and advised replacing the hard drive. Now, after loosing everything and re installing the operating system twice and countless forced restarts I am 8 months out of warranty and not wanting to put more money in to this computer with new mac book pros and HP Envys coming out. If mac can't fix this problem they might be loosing one of their biggest fans.