Q: display anomalies

jaylabelle wrote:
I'm really beginning to suspect that Apple just didn't do accelerated wear tests or anything like that on this design.

No ****!! MBP's dying after 2.3 years + everyone else with dying MBP's definitly does point to that. Thanks very much though for the insight into the manufactoring/design flaws with this though, very insightful.

Message was edited by: spagbol23

Add me to the list.

I occasionally get a line about a pixel wide across my MBP screen.
More frustrating is the fact that my computer occasionally freezes and doesn't allow input from the keyboard or mouse. Applications are still running but only a reset with the power button brings things back to normal. Closing the lid doesn't work.

Sort yourselves out Apple. You are spending millions on your ads telling the world about how your computers don't have viruses or freezing, and are replete with wonderful customer service, and yet here we are telling you your products are suffering from these exact issues and you are doing absolutely nothing about it. If I didn't know better I would think that that's false advertising.

Hi,

I have a Imac Intel with an ATI X1600. I see a lot more people with an Macbook Pro with this problem, but I'm experiencing the exact same problems. Without smcFancontrol my computer easily gets as hot as 65-70 degrees. Without any program running.

The bad thing is, this is an already replaced logic board. The first logic gave me vertical pink/purple lines. Still in warrenty I got a new one replaced. But the last weeks I'm getting the graphical glitches and horizontal lines.

So everyone is saying that the ATI X1600 gets too hot and therefor gets damaged.

The worst is that my Macbook Air is in repair and now I have to work on my screen freezing Imac.

**** Apple, just acknowledge the ATI is the wrong chip and needs better cooling... which a Macbook Pro can't give and clearly a first generation Imac intel can't either. your mistake... thanks.

Message was edited by: Scam

yea well i think we all get the idea that Apple don't care anymore about their Pro users so much, as they make enough money from the iPhone to compensate their market share that they lose in Pro users.

Despite the fact that the people who support iPhone would quiet easily walk away from Apple products as a whole. So much for market retention.

For what it is worth, I have a dual boot system with ubuntu linux and a lot of the artifacts appear on there as well - Often horizontal on the desktop background or reading a pdf. Changing to the 2D Dock in OS X has helped avoid freezing.

Same problems here. Macbook Pro bought in june 2006. All the same graphic errors as above.. Really driving me insane. Shouldn't have to pay anything for something which is the result of a poor construction.
Take your responsibility and show that you care about customers, Apple.

After a month, I finally got my MBP back from Apple, with a replaced logic board (and yes, this was at cost). So far so good, but temperatures are still consistently high and I'm wondering how long this logic board will last...

Well - add me to the list as well... i've been making noises about this for about 6 months now but this is the first time i've seen this thread! thank god because i was beginning to feel like a lone voice in the wilderness...
quick story: MBP 17" 2.16 Core Duo ATI 1600 - purchased new in july of 2006 - no problems for the first 16 or so months - then began to have problems with the pixelated lines etc - shortly thereafter i began to have screen go black or freeze - sound continued, caps lock key worked etc etc.
almost always occurred when trying to watch sreamed video from Hulu etc - DVD's were also problematic but less so - i suspect that the GPU has to work much harder with streamed video, but i'm not sure...

anwyay - to date i have done the following:
1) installed SMC Fan Control - this helped a lot, but i had to keep the fans running at full speed if i was trying to watch video - and i still couldn't make it all the way thru a 30 min episode of Family Guy more than 50% of the time...
2) installed Coolbook - underclocked my CPU to 1.05V - this seems to have helped also but has not eliminated the problem by any means.
3) bit the bullet and did the thermal paste reapplication, good news: this wasn't anywhere near as hard as i thought it would be! bad news: didn't really help. found typical gobs of paste, cleaned it all off and reapplied a thin even layer of Arctic 5. saw a slight drop in temp - maybe 3 degrees C - but still had freezes and glitches when hot.
4) switched from SMC Fan Control to Fan Control - remains to be seen...

i am totally willing to engage in whatever campaign needs to be launched here to get apple to admit to this problem. i was told by genius that my operating temps were "within spec" and that since i didn't have applecare... etc etc

the bottom line is this: within a two years of purchasing a $2700 piece of premium kit it has become unable to do something as simple - and as common - as watch a **** movie, i now use my girlfriend's * 4 year old $600 DELL* to watch Jon Stewart in the mornings... ridiculous.
when i heard about the Nvidia recall i thought that we'd be recognized as well for our troubles - but apparently not.
so i'm sending off a letter to apple at the feedback address
cheers to you all for keeping this issue alive.
bennett

< Edited by Host >

ahhh - forgot to add this... i had a discussion once with an electrical engineer who told me that in his opinion the problem was in the CONNECTION - the soldered connection - between the GPU and the motherboard. poor quality solder, or even solder that gets overheated too often can weaken and start to lose its conductive ability... this might explain why people who have had this problem for a while are now seeing failures occur at relatively "normal" temperatures... the soldered connections might be so degraded that even a small increase in heat makes them freak out. more heat = less conductivity.
just thought i'd mention it.
cheers,
b

This is a really nice guess, but it not explains our very special and reproducable effects.

I think if its really the connection there can be happen all the stuff we can imagine from blackout up to smoke.

hi there macuser128 - if i am understanding you correctly, than i have to say with all due respect - i don't agree, i think it would explain exactly the results we are seeing... but why debate it theoretically? if we take voltage and current readings we can calculate the amount of resistance in the circuit!
right now according to iStat i am reading approx 1.09V at 2.21A at the GPU... according to Ohms Law Amps= Volts/Resistance or Resistance = Voltage/Amperage
therefore at the moment Resistance is .4932....Ohms - or lets just say .5 Ohms... this is at appox 55deg C at the GPU
the CPU is operating at about .99V and about 4A giving us a resistance of about .25Ohms - this with the CPU at 59deg C

so resistance is higher at the GPU even tho the temp is actually 5 deg cooler...
i'm going to reboot with absolutely no fan software or coolbook or anything, let my temps climb up into the mid 70's and see what the figures are then...

anyone out there able to comment on this? i have *no idea* whether the resistances for the GPU and CPU are even comparable... it just seems like since they are both soldered on they should have the same resistance - anyone out there have a MBP Core 2 Duo that doesn't overheat (or have the Nvidia problems)? or even better a unibody? can they give us some stats for these same readings? with that data we could make a slightly more accurate hypothesis about all this...
i just came up with this idea now at 2am, and i haven't taken science since high school so if i'm totally out in left field with this let me know and i promise to take it like a man.
cheers!
bennett

Hey all - here's a copy of the "letter" i sent to Apple using their "feedback" page - it will sound depressingly familiar to most of you - so if you don't want to bother reading it i won't be insulted! but i'd like some feedback myself from anyone who can be bothered...

*CAUTION: LONG BORING STUFF STARTS HERE!*

Dear Apple Folks,
I struggled with choosing an appropriate "type" for this feedback - just as i struggled with the question of writing it in the first place. I have had the experience so far of going to a Genius with this problem on two occasions only to be met with disinterested skepticism on one occasion and disinterested dismissal on another another.
Here in a nutshell is my experience. I have a MBP 17" 2.16 Core Duo, GPU is the ATI 1600 - purchased new in july of 2006. for the first 15 months i had absolutely no problems at all. i was ecstatically happy with my powerful and well designed machine and i felt that the experience had totally made up for the terrible experience i had had with my Titanium PB (a subject for another letter). sadly, i didn't purchase Applecare probably because i couldn't see any fundamental design flaws with this machine.
However, around 16 months i began to notice two things: my machine while never exactly running 'cool' began to run noticeably hotter - it became impossible to use on my lap while wearing shorts. up till now that experience had been somewhat toasty but not painful... but the other problem was far more serious.
i began to have pixelated colored lines appear running horizontally across my screen... these were about 1-2 pixels in width and usually ran across 75-100% of my screen. it took me a week or two to figure out that they were associated with the temperature of my machine, apparently when my machine hit around 70 deg C. as this was a fairly regular state of affairs it was - to say the least - somewhat dissappointing and distracting. it also seemed that the temp would increase the most and the fastest when i was streaming video content from the internet... i began to be unable to get thru even a short 10 min clip without the lines appearing.
then about 3-4 months later things took a turn for the worse. i began to experience frequent screen freezes - audio would continue to play but the picture on my screen would be totally frozen and my mouse would be unresponsive. occasionally the screen wouldn't just freeze it would go totally dark (with any audio continuing to play as before).
faced with this now debilitating problem. the fact is that i need to have access to streamed video for my work - one of the reasons i picked this machine in the first place - the large screen and discreet high quality video card made it seem ideal. the genius who 'helped' me was less than helpful. after telling me - *without bothering to replicate the problem* - that my temps were "within spec" and since i was using VLC as my primary viewing program that it was "most likely a software issue". this despite my repeated statements that the problem was if anything even worse viewing streams using Quicktime Player. all in all he basically refused to believe - or at least acknowledge that there was any kind of problem at all.
needless to say i was dissatisfied but since i wasn't going to get any kind of solution i packed up and went home. after doing a cursory search on the internet i found a pair of utilities - Fan Control and SMC Fan Control - whose sole job was to help regulate overheating issues with the MBP line of machines. well obviously this meant that i wasn't the only person experiencing this problem - people had actually went to the effort to develop not one but two applications do deal specifically with this problem.
these apps helped - to a point. it was now possible for me to get thru a 30 min stream of video without too much in the way of pixelated lines appearing (still there from time to time but smaller and less often) as long as i had the fans going at 5-6000rpms (annoying and noisy). however - trying to watch a 90min or more stream would result in freezes or blackouts *100% of the time*.
that's right - every time.
this prompted my 2nd visit to a Genius - where i was told that it was obviously the third party software that was causing my problems and that the overheating was because i wasn't using the MBP on a hard smooth surface... this despite the fact that it is called a "laptop"! and despite the fact that i could easily watch movies with the MBP on my chest while lying down *the entire first 15 or so months i owned the machine* something i was no longer able to do even on a smooth flat surface.
he, at least, suggested i send it in - but cautioned me that, because i had not puchased Applecare any repairs were most likely going to be expensive - i pointed out that this seemed obviously to be a hardware issue and thus a design or manufacturer's defect. none the less i was told - its out of warranty, best to just *buy a new machine*. well - that seemed unacceptable, so now my $2700 top-of-the-line machine was practically useless for my work. i began to use my girlfriends 3+ year old $600 Dell to watch streaming video - a task it performed without a hitch (it also had far better airport reception but that's another topic)...
in the last few months i have been struggling with alternative methods for dealing with this problem. using everything from Fan Control and Coolbook (yet another application developed to address this issue that supposedly doesn't exist) to actually placing my MPB on blocks of plastic i had put in the freezer... these help but do not eradicate the problem, and i am left asking *why a computer that was purchased 2.5 years ago for $2700 - a top-of-the-line computer - is now practically unusable in a professional fashion while a crappy Dell, purchased 3.5 years ago for $600 is able to outperform it without even getting more than slightly warm*.
then - a few weeks ago, i found this thread: http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=9534516#9534516
and was immediately struck by the number of MBP users who report *the exact same symptoms!* this is obviously not a case of a single problematic machine,
*there is a problem here* and i would love Apple to admit it - just as it did with its Nvidia line of MBP's.
these are your *core customers* Apple. they want to stay loyal, we are begging you to fix this issue with our otherwise excellent machines.
please don't just send me back a canned response and continue to deny there's a problem. the negative experience i had with my Ti PB almost soured me on Apple machines forever, but it seemed that it was just one "bad apple" - now it seems that perhaps Apple's default response to any design or manufacturing flaws is to simply deny they exist.
Please, we are people - mostly professionals - who have made up the core group of committed customers (and evangelists) for the last how many years? we are not idiots - if this many of us say that we all have the *exact same problem,* why can't you listen to us?

the bottom line is i expect more than 16 months of usability from a top-of-the-line professional machine that has been used in an entirely "normal" fashion.
please help us with this issue by either offering to replace the GPU or otherwise fix this issue *at little or no cost* - or at the very least give us a generous credit for trading in our machines for a new machine - that way we both benefit! we're willing to listen to *any reasonable* offer, we want to continue to be loyal customers and Apple evagelists, help us make it happen.

sincerely,
bennett steinmuller
Apple customer since 1987!

You may be right, but i think we both cannot figure out who's right anyway. I hope you have luck with your letter. A lot of us tried that too. Some few really got a replacement

- 1 in the US / for some bucks
- 1 in the netherlands / for free
- 1 somewhere / for some bucks

All the others users her got punished by apple for buying that machine. If you are looking out there you will find a interesting page. Try this Google exactly at:

macbook pro gpu repair Programm X1600

go first, second or third link, you will see when you are right.

Regards macuser128

My MacBook Pro is also one of those that emits a high-pitched buzzing sound, as noted here...
http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1823

I had called AppleCare about it while I was within my one year warranty. I know there is a note about that, but I had decided not to have it repaired since they said it was only noise from a fan.

Unfortunately, shortly after my warranty expire, I started getting more of the display artifacts and display anomalies exactly like those that are mentioned in this thread and now my my MBP will increasingly freeze, especially when opening iPhoto and other graphic intensive processes. I believe it has to do with the GPU getting hot... either directly due to my defective fans and/or the defective ATI Radeon X1600 graphics processing card that everyone here is suffering from.

Here's more of the threads about this on Apples discussion board...
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1726184
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1732374


After all of this time, I've been waiting to hear something about an extended warranty like the NVIDIA program just announced...
http://support.apple.com/kb/TS2377?viewlocale=en_US

So, I'm still staring at a useless MacBook Pro... still asking Apple Store and AppleCare employees about it, but nothing's changed. I just came across this web site and submitted my petition info...
http://petition.theatypical.net/

If nothing comes from it, I will gather information and seek legal counsel to pursue a class action law suit. Apple has had plenty of complaints and time to do the right thing.

I love Apple and have already purchased a new MacBook Pro, however they need to get the right people to handle this or they will continue to harm their reputation and upset customers, such as long time loyal fans as well as first time Mac owners, etc that have purchased these and are stuck with a defective product.

Bringing more attention to this until it reaches a level to where it can get resolved is better than having it drag on and on and drag Apple down. Again, I'm a very loyal customer of Apple's, but this needs to be resolved!

Also...

These were recently posted online...
Friday, March 20 2009
MacBook Pros with ATI Radeon X1600 graphics cards still experiencing issues
http://www.macfixit.com/article.php?story=20090320111948165

2009-03-05
MacBook Pro with ATI Radeon X1600 distorted video & glitches
http://torley.com/macbook-pro-with-ati-radeon-x1600-distorted-video-glitches

So when will Apple address this is in some way and stop the increasing flow of complaints from angry customers? I know there are imperfections with technology and some customers that will always complain and never be happy (like millions of Windows users) but I hate to see Apple allow this to be left to only fester and cause damage to their reputation of having very high customer satisfaction.

WHEN WILL THIS BE ENOUGH AND WHEN WILL THE RIGHT PERSON MAKE THE RIGHT DECISION TO HANDLE THIS LACK OF ATI QUALITY CONTROL ISSUE? I know it's not your direct fault Apple that ATI made a defective graphics card, but it is not being handled in the right way for far too long!