MacBook Pro (2010) Freeze

BigCat400, thank you for that info. I wonder how long it will be before Apple and Nvidia address this issue?

Here's a quick recap of everything about this issue:
1. It's a hard freeze of the graphics and some services. Everything will stop and the mouse will continue to work for a few seconds before stopping too.
2. Things like Skype and iTunes will continue to work, as you can still hear the sound/music.
3. No current Apple Updates affect it (either for better or worse).
4. It may or may not unfreeze after 10-15minutes of waiting.
5. It affects 15" and 17" MacBook Pro, with some (fewer) reported issues of 13" MacBook Pro's doing it.
6. It happens in both Mac OS X and Windows 7
7. Hard Drives don't affect it at all. It happens with both SSDs, 5400rpm drives and 7200rpm drives.
8. There are no entries in the System Log file.
9. The machine is generally not under load at the time of the crash.
10. Getting it replaced by Apple won't fix it, the replacement machine will still have the issue.
11. If you unplug the Display port and plug it back in, you will get multicoloured static on the external screen.
12. The temperature of the machine doesn't seem to matter. Low CPU Usage and low temps don't affect it.
13. Being on battery power doesn't affect it. Some people report it only when on Battery Power. All of mine have happened when not on battery power.
14. Apple Hardware Test shows nothing out of the ordinary.
15. Using the Data Transfer to get data from an older machine doesn't affect it.
16. It seems to mainly affect the Core i7 MacBook Pros, however there are a few cases of the i5's doing it too (and through the 1-2 reported 13" ones, the C2D chipsets too).
17. The frequency of the issue is completely random, in some cases every 10 minutes, in others once a week or less.
18. 3 of the cases were running Skype, a lot of others were running Firefox or Chrome as well. The Firefox/Chrome one isn't statistically important, as a lot of people are running a web browser 24/7. The Skype one is more interesting, as it happened in the middle of a call. For me, 2 of the crashes were in the middle of a Skype call and I rarely make calls on Skype.

If your error isn't the one described, if your computer isn't doing the whole lock up that everyone has described, please don't post in this thread, instead, make your own thread that documents your problem. Issues with putting your computer to sleep and graphics glitching out are not a part of this issue.

I think the most interesting points out of everything I've made is the fact that most people are running i7 MacBook Pros and that the frequency that it happens varies so much. For me it has happened about once a week, for some others it happens almost constantly. Perhaps this could be investigated further (environmental factors, applications running, temps + cpu usage + graphics card usage).

One more point is that the crash happens at times when it's NOT doing the graphics switching. It'll be in the middle of a Skype call or using a program that has already kicked in the nVidia card. There's no reason for it to swap back to the old card in the middle of whatever you're doing, so it's unlikely that that's the issue.

If I've missed anything, please post. If this isn't the error you're having, post elsewhere.

Dustin

EDIT: Also, don't bother saying that this is your last Mac because of this error, we all know that's not true. Once you've used Mac you never go back.

Message was edited by: Duk242

So, with #10, you are basically saying every one of these new machines released by Apple has the same problem? While it is possible, I'd think this board would be overloaded with posts. Some people claim they have run for weeks without any problem.

About logs, /var/log/kernel.log reports a "NVDA(OpenGL): Channel exception!" when the problem occurs.

Actually that's a valid point, I just summarised the previous posts on this topic.
The replacement may also have the issue. There wasn't enough people saying "Hey the replacement works great!", though, there wasn't many people saying the replacement was faulty too.

I work at an Apple Reseller (only on weekends), so I'll ask the guys there if they've had many people report the issue.

Dustin

Excellent summary. Thank you for this.

One thing that is inconsistent as Bigcat mentioned was the log entry. I know I never got a channel exception entry as I scoured the console looking for any hint at all as to what might be causing this. I never saw anything out of the ordinary, only messages indicating I performed a hard unexpected restart (after it booted from the freeze, obviously). Are others getting indications in the log or no?

-SM

I just wanted to second what "BigCat400" said about #10 on that list. As much as this thread is extensive, I'm guessing it would be 100 pages longer by now if it was really happening on anywhere near 100% of the new MBPs (or even 100% of the i7 MBP 17").

I wonder if the problem might be a software glitch relating to some common piece of software being run by people in this thread, or perhaps a hardware problem relating to a small batch of a certain MBP component.

Again, good luck to all. I'm following this thread/issue with interest.

Well it is mainly happening to i7 users. I've only seen a couple hard freezes reported on the i5.

http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=917392

Duk242's recap perfectly matches my machine's problems.
And like him, I do not get a log entry when the freeze happens.
About they skype assumption, I do use it quite often but it happened only once (out of 6) while using it.
Biggest source of freezes is Xcode for me; It happened about 3 out of the 6 times when right-clicking on a method's name on a source file.
I'm using an external screen most of the time, but I have to say it never happened when not plugged into an external screen. I connect my screen using apple's miniDP to DVI cable.
I started the sshd service to test if I could still log in from another computer when the freeze happens, as music keeps playing, etc... I can connect and I come up to the password entry. After typing the password, bash never loads.

I'm on a 15" mbp core i7 with 8gb of ram.

Message was edited by: armadillu

Does locking on one or the other graphic card with gfxCardStatus solve the problem ? To me it sounds like another freeze I heard about before on these new machines, that is caused by some application trying CUDA APIs without the NVidia being turned on. I would try forcing the system to use to NVidia always to see if that would solve it. Fortunately, I do not have this problem.

EDIT: if it happens under Win7 too then I'm probably wrong. Mmm. On a PC laptop I would say this is a heat issue, but then unfreezing would not seem logical.

Connecting an external screen automatically forces a switch to the Nvidia card... And I got all my freezes while using an external screen. I was also hoping the problem would be in the gpu switching, but I am afraid it's not.

the problems explained by duk242 is exactly what is happening to my macbook pro. it has happened 3 times so far. once with skype during a call - i could hear the other person and the other person could still here me.
2nd one was while listening to itunes - music was still playing though.
3rd one was while wtaching a video on vlc media player. i could still hear the audio but the video was stuck- i thot the problem was with the video file - i was in full screen but guess what - the cursor moved a lil bit and then froze - i could not escape or anything. waited for 9 mins and voila, **** started working again ? man..HOW DID APPLE go wrong?

Forcing to NVIDIA does not solve the problem. Forcing to Intel does. At least in my system.

Thanks for the recap. This is happening to me as well.

There has been some discussion as to what is going on (software wise) on the system when it freezes. All of my freezes (3-4 now) have occurred while watching a long (20-40min) video in VLC. Also, all freezes have been while plugged into a Dell SP2309W external monitor via DVI. The video was playing on the external monitor.

On a related note, I have also had the 'digital static' problem on the external monitor after waking up the display. It doesn't happen 100% of the time, but it happens frequently enough to be annoying. Moving the mouse for a few seconds seems to make it snap out of it.

Strangely enough, I also own a Dell SP2309W and I've always got the freeze when the monitor was plugged in. Maybe the issue is related to a certain resolution or screen?

Adding to the discussion

I have a MBP 17" I7
8GB Ram
5400 RPM HD

I have had it only happen a few times over the last few months - true pity.

I did notice that I was extremely close to our of free RAM before it happened and it had been runing for several days (in and out of sleep mode and on and off battery)
Hope a fix comes would hate to stop loving the machine - and hope it does not happe to Wifes machine or all **** will break loose