Q: MacBook Pro 2011 17" hard freeze

For me the worst scenario is that there is a design flaw, and on Apple's part nothing can be done about it since, well, the flaw is in design itself, and what we eventually get is a piece of firmware update that underclocks everything under Mac OS X.

@ama,

yes, that would be bad. but again, heat is not the issue in my case. my machine never gets warmer than 91C in OSX. yet it can hit 99C in Windows with no adverse affects to performance and stability.

Hi everyone,

After trying every suggested method to crash my 2011 MacBook Pro (2.2 i7) I CAN NOT crash it. I've tried the yes > command in the terminal for all 8 threads, I've ran 4 movies through handbrake (all of which are 7+ GB in size) and I've played about two straight hours of counter strike source (on full settings). None of which can recreate the crash. The CPU get to 86C but never crashes the system.

Is it possible that I may have just gotten 1 in 100 MBP's and mine has no problem?

It is a tough call.. I have 3 more days before I hit 14 day period... Although I haven't seen any issue with my (under)usage so far, I am going to try those tests and see it how it responds although I'm sure its going to crash.

I have been using Logic Express fine though with about 30-40tracks running with several plugins loaded without issues.

I hope Apple acknowledges this soon.

I don't think it's been mentioned, but this sounds like a pretty classic ATI driver issue under Windows (I have the exact same symptoms with a Radeon 5770 in my Windows 7 machine). I know the issue for me is related to automatic voltage switching, so you might try finding a tool that would let you manually specify the timings, which would prevent the card from switching voltages.

to the people who say this doesn't happen:


I've noticed that it doesn't always happen. I've been able to reproduce it at times, and other times it's worked just fine.


to the people this is happening to:

Please call apple. Let them know this is happening to you. If you live near an apple store please take the machine in. Please show them what is happening. I called tech support and the guy i talked to hadn't even heard of this issue yet. He tried to help me though, and offered me a replacement. I declined at this time because i believe this issue will be fixed in software but if it DOES turn out to be a hardware issue that requires replacing, i wanted to have the call on record. I recommend everyone do the same thing.

He also asked me to go to www.apple.com/feedback/ and let apple know what is happening.

Stevo, try this:

Instal the program gfxcardstatus and put in Integrated mode only
Run Chrome and execute this: http://www.chromeexperiments.com/detail/webgl-aquarium/?f=webgl with 1000 fish.

credits to: Adrien J. (founder of this method to crash 2011 macbook pro in 1 second, lol)

I have no freezes with my new Macbook Pro 17 inch 2011.

Runned Cinebench, Handbrake conversions, SmallluxGPU etc the temperature raise to 85 Celsius and fans kick in 5000 rpm and then slowly goes to 3700-4000 rpm and wont go higher then 85 Celsius.

ok now on engadget http://www.engadget.com/2011/03/21/new-macbook-pros-freezing-under-heavy-load/

I wonder if we'd get more success if we took this to the ati forums, so far apple not acknowledging this is pretty disrespectful to say the least.

I was under the impression that CTO orders could only be shipped back to Apple for a refund. If I'm wrong, I'll be very pleased to just drive it over this week and return it and not pay any more shipping charges.

Ok, was playing with the OpenGL "shark" test in chrome, and got a hard lockup after a while. (No mouse movement this time).

I was able to ssh in and "sudo reboot". After a minute or so, the fans spundown but the screen remained frozen. After another minute or two I was back at my functioning desktop.. almost didn't even realize it had restarted as I never saw the apple logo or hear any of the usual restart noises (It did, I checked the console logs). Was really really weird.

I'm sure a "shutdown -h now" would work too; both are likely a lot better for your machine/data/hdd than holding the power button!

You obviously missed the post where a user reapplied the thermal paste and continued to have freezes. Don't ask me to find in this mess now though.

Good to see Engadget picking up the story.

At least Apple might be more inclined to say something about it....though in my experience, Apple doesn't acknowledge a problem until they have a fix for it (yellow tinting iMacs) or solution to mitigate it (iPhone 4 & free cases).

As has been said, call in and at least get your incident on record. I can't do a replacement right now because I have a business trip to go on in the morning and need it now. Maybe I'll let them replace it when I get back, provided no fix has been released by that time.

Has anyone noticed if this problem will affect DJ software? ie: Virtual DJ. My previous dj computer died, and I just went to best buy the other day and bought a 15" standard $1799 customization so I could be back up and running. I haven't run tests yet, (Haven't even opened the box!) Should I return? If so any replacement ideas instead? Thanks.