Why is my Macbook Pro Screen Glitching and Freezing?

A memory or GPU issue are the two most likely candidates.

You can try running the Apple Diagnostics to see if any hardware issues are detected. The diagnostics may report a problem with a third party SSD, so you can probably ignore that if it occurs.

The best way to differentiate between a hardware & software issue is by testing the system with a clean install of macOS. A clean install is when you erase the whole physical SSD which may require clicking on "View" within Disk Utility and select "Show All Devices" before the physical SSD appears on the left pane of Disk Utility.

After erasing the whole physical SSD, you need to reinstall macOS and test the system thoroughly before doing any of the following:

• Restore/migrate from a backup
• Installing any software
• Signing into AppleID or iCloud

You can also try using a bootable Memtest86 USB stick to perform a longer more thorough test of the memory than the Apple Diagnostics will perform.

It is possible the heatsink thermal paste needs to be replaced since the original Apple heatsink thermal paste is known to dry out. The pixelation makes me think overheating GPU/CPU more than a memory issue, but it can be hard to be sure.

elsrays wrote:

https://discussions.apple.com/content/attachment/7fadfbd1-bb64-40f7-a9ce-1f61b3835c87

https://discussions.apple.com/content/attachment/db53ab2c-b5fc-4eef-8d5b-8f6bf3a6ee2d

https://discussions.apple.com/content/attachment/7fb848c0-ebd3-4ab8-94dd-72bfeccd0141

https://discussions.apple.com/content/attachment/07d0f152-0d10-4a97-856f-0a86e9559099

I have a Macbook Pro (mid 2012) and it has been working perfectly until last week when the screen starting glitching, gradually worsening until now my whole computer freezes and gets hot even if I don't have multiple things open or a taxing software like adobe photoshop. At first I thought it could be a virus as multiple people use this laptop (the vpn is on at all times), so I have factory reset my mac and reinstalled Catalina twice already, the problem still persists.

I use this laptop for internet browsing and school work and I haven't dropped it or knocked it hard. I also often connect my mac to the tv by using a 2M MiniDisplayPort DP to HDMI Male Thunderbolt Cable and have been doing so for almost a year with no problems, so I'm stuck on what the problem is or how to go about fixing it.

Any advice or help would be greatly appreciated as I really want to save this computer.

This computer also used to work perfectly before this as I upgraded it to an SSD drive and 16GB of RAM.

Hopefully reliable 3rd party RAM w/ the exact specs. Put the old RAM back in and compare your results.

OWC/MacSales and Crucial or the two brands recommended for best results (did I say exact specs ! )

Did you change out the SATA cable when you put in that SSD...(?) you make no mention which mid-2012 an issue with the mid 2012 especially the 13"...

SATA replacement 15" MBP mid-2012

https://eshop.macsales.com/item/Apple/9230084#15_inch

SATA replacement 13"MBP mid 2012

https://eshop.macsales.com/item/Apple/8211480/%20%2013%22%20MacBook%20Pro%20SATA

if that is not your issue— I would expect other hardware failure.

elsrays wrote:

I have a 13" mid 2012 macbook pro and as it was my dad that put in the SSD drive I'm unsure if he replaced the cable (I'll ask him later) and I made sure to get compatible RAM with my mac.

I don't think the graphical issues show are caused by the SSD or SATA Cable, but boot issues & freezing could be.

This is what i got off of ebay:

DDR3 16GB (2x8GB) 1600MHz PC3L-12800 Sodimm Laptop Memory for MacBook Pro 13" i5

Unfortunately the memory specs listed are not enough to guarantee compatibility these days since there are a lot of other memory timings which are critical for compatibility, but Apple does not publish that information. Macs are very picky about the memory they use. We would need to see pictures of any labels on those memory modules to try to figure out if they are fully compatible.....even then it will depend on how much information that memory vendor provides to the public.

This SSD and new RAM had no issues when we first put them in and continued to work as they should until the problem I have now.

How long has this memory been installed into this laptop?