Q: Late 2006 iMac, Lines, Kernel Panic, Freeze, Reboot, Restart, Serial W8 ?

pbcubed - I did install the official NVidia drivers under Linux. I got all those fancy animations when moving the screens around. I also played some video, and used some pictures in Picasa and watched some flash videos. Not very heavy work but similar to my use with the iMac.

I think Ubuntu is using the GPU with less overhead than the OS X.

Regarding replacement of the GPU - Sounds like an option, but then again I am not sure that my GPU is really damaged now, it may very well be Snow Leopard. Heck, we can't know anything until Apple steps up and responds to this issue. They are dead silent. Strange, I thought they "love all their users" :S.

odedia wrote:
I think Ubuntu is using the GPU with less overhead than the OS X.

Sounds like a viable theory to me. Maybe Ubuntu drivers make little or no use of specific hardware features because they are more "generic"?
Whereas Apple can contour their OSs to make maximum use of all hardware features since they can target specific hardware known to be in their machines.

odedia wrote:
Regarding replacement of the GPU - Sounds like an option, but then again I am not sure that my GPU is really damaged now, it may very well be Snow Leopard.

Perhaps. IIRC others have posted that SL may aggravate existing hardware issues by causing machines to run hotter (I've nothing to back that, just seeing reports in these forums). But I'd not expect Apple to accommodate older (possibly faulty) hardware by releasing firmware/OS patches that lower performance by lessening its use of hardware Still think yours may be hardware esp. if the problem developed over time & you found removing heat from the box (the HD) lessened symptoms.
Guess you can pursue things OR enjoy Ubuntu on the box... It's come a long way & there are loads of freebies (a bit OT).

One more thing. More of a crutch/hack for GPU/VRAM-damaged units than a fix, but IIRC there was trickery one could do to disable OS X's GPU use without using it's equiv. of safe mode. It involved modding a system file to tell OS X your unit had no/zero VRAM, don't recall how.

I don't know how much it would help in the comparison to Ubuntu, but Mac OS X Technology Overview: Graphics and Multimedia Technologies is a nice introduction to the rendering technologies used in OS X.

Weeeellllll, you can forget everything I said. I just started having weird dots on Ubuntu as well.

This is a hardware problem for sure.

Apple needs to address this.

Apple needs to address this.

I'm just curious. How long after the longest warranty Apple offers do you think the company should offer free hardware repairs or other forms of compensation? How many unit failures over what period of time do you think is enough to show the existence of some manufacturing or design defect that justifies this?

There is a "careful what you wish for" aspect to this: if we expect Apple to adopt this policy for lots of units over long periods of time, then purchase prices will rise.

Since when is it the users׳ job to care more about the company than it is the company to care about the users? Most of us PAID for a 3 years warranty and had the problem begin a few weeks after it expired. This is not some random amount of people, this is a lot of people, maybe all owners for that matter. It is not a result of the users behavior, it is a hardware design flaw.

If you want to keep being the consumer who accepts mediocre, unreliable products, that's fine but don't judge the rest of us who paid hefty amounts and expected to get some fair amount of use out of these machines. Its just a computer, not a car. If Kia can offer 7 years warranty for a CAR, then apple should be able to fix this design flaw. God knows they cost almost the same .

Peace.

I don't care about the company per se, but I care a lot about what I have to pay for its products. If I pay for a three year warranty, I expect to get three full years of protection, but after that I don't expect to automatically get free repairs or replacements because of a simple principle I learned long ago: there is no free lunch. One way or another, I'm going to have to pay for it.

So I really would like an answer to my question: how long after a warranty expires do you think Apple (or any other company) should continue to warrant its products? A week? A month? Two years? Where do you draw the line?

R-C-R, I distinguish between two cases: one is when a product is just fine and has the occasional problems that a warranty would cover, things that impact very few users and maybe even a single user. This type of problem should be covered under the one year warranty, or 3 years if you paid for it.

Another problem is when a specific product was found to have a basic design flaw, and impacts most if not all the users who purchased this product. I would contrast such a scenario to a recall being done by a car manufacturer. I would expect a company at the size of Apple with its product price tags to support products at least 5 years for these types of DESIGN FLAWS.

You are acting as if I am saying imaginary things here. Apple did this in the past many times with their laptop batteries, going back to iBooks. I want to point out to you that I have right in front of me now a Time Capsule that was replaced out of warranty by apple after 2 years of ownership, although the product had a 1 year warranty. Apple did this because it found a DESIGN FLAW in its planning of the power box which influenced ALL users after the 1 year warranty expired. If it wasn't for sites like http://timecapsuledead.org, Apple would have never bothered to deal with it because the "masses" wouldn't know it was such a common problem.

@odedia
Thank you! You hit them in the face!

+So my previous reply got removed. Because of Non-constructive rants or complaints.+
+I don't think so. I had answer a question. But they don't like it when I said a few things with it.+

I would like to see a three year full warranty if the product are that good then Apple needs to do that. Show that they believe in their products.
Why?
I've bought a iMac in june 2007 the first problems started 5 or 6 months after buying it. I didn't know it was hardware failure. I didn't buy apple care. And after 21 months the iMac is slow, hanging, ticking. But for a computer from €2000,- / $2400,- you can expect it will last longer then 21 months. If I was the only one that can happen but I'm not.
A lot of people are saying that the a Mac will be cheaper than a computer in the long run. Not!
At this moment I would rather buy a computer with three year warranty and Windows Bugs. Than a iMac that has got hardware failure. Sure it can happen with a Windows computer but at least I'm covered!

*Apple said they weren't perfect but they want to make their users happy.*
*I'm not happy and I'm not going to buy again an expensive Mac. Because Apple won't solve issue that are really visual to many!*
In long run this will cost them more money. Like many people how are planning to buy an iMac / Macbook can now read that manufacture or design flaws won't get fixed. Even when the problems appear later then the one year warranty.

Where do you draw the line? If many iMacs fail on the same way then you fix all the iMacs that are failing. That is the line for me! Unbelievable that this doesn't get solved! There is thin line to loyalty, if you promise that it is working! Then you responsible that it is working.

Message was edited by: elice82@

odedia wrote:
Another problem is when a specific product was found to have a basic design flaw, and impacts most if not all the users who purchased this product.

To support any such theory in this context, you need the answer to this question: +What percentage of the specific iMac models discussed have failed/are failing with what specific hardware fault?+
IOW, for X / Y * 100, we need the X (# of failed units) & the Y (# of total units sold) by model for any specific hardware failure.

Then we can assess, as I mentioned below, whether the failure rate exceeds any expected one of these designs or their components. _Or that the rate exceeds any actual or expected one for this industry_:

http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=11911595&#11911595

This topic matter has been batted around quite a bit WRT 3+ yr old iMacs. Having two iMacs w/issues myself, I've put quite a bit into my posts (as have others like R C-R).
If you've seen my posts, my opinion is that Apple may have been able to reduce the failure rate/increases the longevity of these units through thermal management such that operating temps were lower by 5C or more across the board. But you'd likely have to give up a bit of something (quiet operation, excessively slim profile, etc) to get this.

It would be nice if everything lasted as long as we wanted it to.
And "Historical performance is no indicator of future performance"

pbcubed wrote:
X / Y * 100, we need the X (# of failed units) & the Y (# of total units sold) by model for any specific hardware failure.

It's kinda of hard to get those numbers X and Y if Apple is saying:
- Their aren't any reported problems related to this issue;
- It not a know issue;
- Your computer works fine.

my opinion is that Apple may have been able to reduce the failure rate/increases the longevity...

Doesn't solve my issue. Then again my was 21 months old, not 3+ years.

Historical performance is no indicator of future performance

That is what investment insurance companies said too. But look at them now they paying the price too. Because they weren't clear over the expense scale.
People where paying too much money on the expense. Now they have to compensate.

elice82@ wrote:
It's kinda of hard to get those numbers X and Y if Apple is saying:
- Their aren't any reported problems related to this issue;
- It not a know issue;
- Your computer works fine.

If you expect to get anywhere with this, you need to avoid obvious exaggeration: Apple has never said everybody's computer is working fine. And, believe it or not, it is a well known issue that as products age the failure rate goes up, even among perfectly designed & manufactured ones.

The crux of the matter is how many fail & when. To even guess about that, you can't just look for the "X" cases. You also have to look for "Y-X" ones -- those units not failing over the same period of time. You don't need to count every unit for a plausible estimate, but neither can you exclude the ones that aren't failing from your survey.

Figure out how to do that kind of survey & you may have something. Otherwise, you just have a guess.

R C-R wrote:
Apple has never said everybody's computer is working fine.

No, al least the part 'everybody' but with mine they did. They said it is working fine. Yes, crashing, hanging and ticking fine.

Sure the rate goes up at 21 months, it did crash and hang before the 21 months.
So I've had my pleasure (6 months working fine) with Apple's iMac, I have been switching... and has been an experience. Called Apple (answer: wait till it's it broke), checked it out (cost me money), got a lawer (even that cost me money) and on top of that Apple ignored my lawer. So basically I'm better of with a computer with Windows... its crapy too but at least I'm not fighting with people.

Like many already said: We don't have to guess what is wrong only Apple should acknowled that there is something wrong. And that they do there best to get it fixed. I'm not asking for more.

I'm not the one to do the investigation (I'm user), a company that is named Apple should do the investigation because they getting paid very well for their products.
Everybody (yes everybody including me) can make a mistake but at least admitted that you did do something wrong. Then you can solve the issue.

A point of weakness doesn't mean totally weakness!

{quote:title=elice82@ wrote:}So basically I'm better of with a computer with Windows... its crapy too but at least I'm not fighting with people.{quote}

I got myself an Asus laptop a year ago. Developed boot problems so I called their support. Very helpful. They arranged a courier to pick the computer up and drop it off with a new motherboard. Hasn't missed a beat since. THAT'S service.