Q: Lion randomly crashes - black screen

Does anyone know if the Apple Store will do anything if my mid-2010 MBP is out of the 1 year warranty? Strongly considering selling this thing and just buying one of the new MacBook Airs with the same specs.

Lion does seem to run a bit warmer than Snow Leopard, but those heat readings are well within the tollerance for the chips. The max temperature for the i7 chip is 100C, above that it shuts down.

Well, I've tried all the "fixes" and I'm still getting the BSOD.

1) reset PRAM/SMC

2) install gfxCardStatus

3) install Nvidia CUDA drivers, latest version

4) delete the windowserver plist in ~/Library/Preferences/ByHost and reboot

5) update to 10.7.1

6) rub screen with a freshly slain chicken heart to expunge the evil spirits

7) place MBP inside a pyramid shaped structure made from old iPods to draw off the negative energy

Seriously!? I long had to deal with this kind of nonsense with Redmond's craptastic O/S, but this is Mac. Aren't you supposed to be all, like, Thinking Different!? I converted a little over a year ago, and now I get bit in the nether regions by your 3 steps forward 2 steps back "upgrade." This feels like Windows ME all over again. And before someone chimes in about running out to the Apple Store for, as other postings indicate, a COMPLETETLY POINTLESS LOGIC BOARD SWAP, I have the misfortune of living in a country with absolutely no Apple Stores for the moment, so apparently I'm utterly boned. I am appalled by this outrageous lapse of Apple Genius. How can I recommend you to anyone anymore? Your latest modus operandi seems to be to keep ignoring your colossal ballsups until the next product release. Is this what I have to look forward to now? No way to upgrade my MBP and forced to use an aging Snow Leopard just to get some stability until I can get back to America and upgrade to one of your products that doesn't instantly kick you in the gonads the second you try to upgrade it? Unbelievable. I used to think this company was utterly badass. This seriously shakes my faith in the Apple mythos...

Mark Marin...I too have had inexplicable heat problens, which have been radom and linked to using Aperture, a program I never had issues with in the past under SL...I use it for a home business, so this is a real pain...yesterday, every time I went into the program, the computer would heat up to 98 - 99 degress celsius, and at one point I even saw 100 degrees. I had to get a job out that didn't get out. During all of this, Aperture also crashed about 4 times. Coming out of sleep can also iniatiate the heat issue, and yesterday I thought the computer was going to become airborne on a plain old website with a few graphics. I had to shut down twice in order to stop the heating issue. I called Apple, and they want to take a look at the computer, and at this point I think a hardware check is a good idea.

n31V10, this is for you too. In my opinion, this is really not a hardware issue. There are some bonafide cases of hardware failure, but by and large the majority of these issues points to a driver problem...a big one. My Nvidia card works just fine switching between descrete and integrated graphics, BUT SOMETIMES IT SEEMS TO GET STUCK. The computer works harder and harder trying to resolve the issue, and that's when the heating issue starts. Apple has been concerned and helpful, and if their hardware check at their CA site is negative, I will try to stick with Lion until this issues is resolved in an update. If it interfers with my work flow too much, I will migrate back to SL from a clone I made before updating to Lion. I couldn't even dream of going back to MS because my porgrams wouldn't even work in that environment. I will update to let y'all know if Apple found anything.

It's hardly an issue with heat. At least for me. Sometimes it happens a couple of minutes after I turn my Mac on. Long before it reaches any higher temps.

iMac 27" i7 2.93, 16GB/2TB (mid 2010). Lion 10.7.1.

Here's a summary of my specific problem.

Mid 2010 15" mbp.

Seemingly random black screen crashes.

What follows is a copy of an email sent to apple support.

Many thanks for your help in this matter. Things are greatly improved after paring down the third party software on my machine.

I do feel however, that I have a little more information with you may find interesting.

I have used the Sparrow email client for quite a while, and it's been stable under 10.6, but is almost guaranteed to show the cash issue under Lion.

Sparrow had been updated for 10.7 by the developer.

Sparrow is listed as compatible on the 'roaring apps' website you recommend to me.

With the aid of some software to switch between the Intel and nVidia graphics cards…. here's what I've found.

Using the Intel graphics adapter, Sparrow performs perfectly (I've written this email using such a configuration)

If I allow the system to switch dynamically between the two cards, Sparrow mis-draws itself as soon as the nVidia card is in use.

Switch back to the Intel gfx card, and everything is perfect.

Quitting Sparrow, and switching to the nVidia graphics card, and the system crashes as I start Sparrow with the following report.

 

Interval Since Last Panic Report:  38647 sec

 

Panics Since Last Report:          5

Anonymous UUID:                    74xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx7E5

Wed Aug 24 20:13:12 2011

panic(cpu 0 caller 0xffffff7f809492bf): NVRM[0/1:0:0]: Read Error 0x0061021c: CFG 0xffffffff 0xffffffff 0xffffffff, BAR0 0xc0000000 0xffffff80a04b5000 0x0a5480a2, D0, P3/4

Backtrace (CPU 0), Frame : Return Address

0xffffff807c8b3210 : 0xffffff8000220702

0xffffff807c8b3290 : 0xffffff7f809492bf

0xffffff807c8b3320 : 0xffffff7f80a393fc

0xffffff807c8b3370 : 0xffffff7f80c140f0

0xffffff807c8b3400 : 0xffffff7f80927454

0xffffff807c8b3520 : 0xffffff7f80929bbb

0xffffff807c8b35b0 : 0xffffff7f80929c84

0xffffff807c8b35f0 : 0xffffff7f80929ce1

0xffffff807c8b3690 : 0xffffff7f8094e5e3

0xffffff807c8b3880 : 0xffffff7f80950151

0xffffff807c8b3960 : 0xffffff7f817bf008

0xffffff807c8b39a0 : 0xffffff7f817cde06

0xffffff807c8b39c0 : 0xffffff7f817e96d4

0xffffff807c8b3a00 : 0xffffff7f817e9739

0xffffff807c8b3a40 : 0xffffff7f817d1c51

0xffffff807c8b3a90 : 0xffffff7f81789753

0xffffff807c8b3b10 : 0xffffff7f817881c4

0xffffff807c8b3b40 : 0xffffff7f8178dbfd

0xffffff807c8b3b70 : 0xffffff800065259d

0xffffff807c8b3be0 : 0xffffff800065293c

0xffffff807c8b3c40 : 0xffffff80006530e0

0xffffff807c8b3d80 : 0xffffff80002a3738

0xffffff807c8b3e80 : 0xffffff8000222ff6

0xffffff807c8b3eb0 : 0xffffff8000214829

0xffffff807c8b3f10 : 0xffffff800021bb58

0xffffff807c8b3f70 : 0xffffff80002ae380

0xffffff807c8b3fb0 : 0xffffff80002d83a3

      Kernel Extensions in backtrace:

         com.apple.NVDAResman(7.0.4)[7E65ECA2-D3A1-35F8-B845-C975FB531E7E]@0xffffff7f808 e9000->0xffffff7f80bbffff

            dependency: com.apple.iokit.IOPCIFamily(2.6.5)[95ABB490-3AB5-3D5E-9C21-67089A9AE6A1]@0xffff ff7f80875000

            dependency: com.apple.iokit.IONDRVSupport(2.3)[E99C8907-946D-3F1A-A261-4C0F2D5D0451]@0xffff ff7f808d7000

            dependency: com.apple.iokit.IOGraphicsFamily(2.3)[897EB322-FD55-36D7-A68E-9E9C34A74A84]@0xf fffff7f8089f000

         com.apple.nvidia.nv50hal(7.0.4)[2E84958C-1EEC-316B-9F7A-68C368F83476]@0xffffff7 f80bc0000->0xffffff7f80ee1fff

            dependency: com.apple.NVDAResman(7.0.4)[7E65ECA2-D3A1-35F8-B845-C975FB531E7E]@0xffffff7f808 e9000

         com.apple.GeForce(7.0.4)[6F2B5A22-F2F2-34A6-9721-8011B1E03300]@0xffffff7f817700 00->0xffffff7f8182cfff

            dependency: com.apple.NVDAResman(7.0.4)[7E65ECA2-D3A1-35F8-B845-C975FB531E7E]@0xffffff7f808 e9000

            dependency: com.apple.iokit.IONDRVSupport(2.3)[E99C8907-946D-3F1A-A261-4C0F2D5D0451]@0xffff ff7f808d7000

            dependency: com.apple.iokit.IOPCIFamily(2.6.5)[95ABB490-3AB5-3D5E-9C21-67089A9AE6A1]@0xffff ff7f80875000

            dependency: com.apple.iokit.IOGraphicsFamily(2.3)[897EB322-FD55-36D7-A68E-9E9C34A74A84]@0xf fffff7f8089f000

BSD process name corresponding to current thread: WindowServer

Mac OS version:

11B26

I assume that client apps on the machine have no knowledge of which gfx drivers are being used by the system, as they are abstracted away from this by the operating system, so am I correct in assuming that something is amiss with either the nVidia drivers or my nVidia hardware ?

There we go....

seems like Apple just released a firmware update for iMac:

http://www.macrumors.com/2011/08/24/apple-releases-imac-graphics-firmware-update -to-address-freezing-issues/

let's hope something like this will be released for MacBook Pro Mid 2010 too

I have a mid 2010 27" i7 iMac.

The update doesn't appear for my machine.

Come on, Apple.

Please. My first Mac was the LC some 20 years ago.

I've been faithful.  But now I am about to jump ship.

For my business I need a computer that doesn't randomly swith off.

At least I need to know that Apple acknowledge the problem and are working on a fix.

The silence doesn't work.

I just got back my macbook pro bac from repair. Actually after waiting a week, they could not find anything wrong. The genius had requested to have the logic board replaced; they found it unnecessary at the repare center in TN. So after starting my mbp, reinstalling lion (as they give you back your machine with snow leopard ??), go to photobooth ==> full screen ==> effects ==> page 2 and "voila" BSOD (black screen crash) and the great technician in Tenesse could not find any problem ??? I called support and they told me to bring it back to the genius bar tomorow and to send it back for having the logic board replaced. She mentioned "insist that they do so". That was what they were supposed to do. In any case, I don't care that they replace the logic board or whatever they want; just fix it and if you can't replace it. My MBP has applecare warranty and I have been wasting hours trying to get this MBP working with lion without crashing. We used to think that mac were bug free; it use to be a commercial for switching from windows. It is getting to be ridiculously disapointing.

Yep locks up in boot camp for me as well.

I only use boot camp to play games. Crashed to black screen while playing Wolrd of Tanks.

Going to upgrade the drivers to the whql ones on nvidia.com and see if it happens. Curernt ones are from the boot camp assistant install.

Will keep you posted.

well looks like 10.7.2 seed 2 fixes the prob for me. but only just installed so will keep you posted, but so far so good.....

Please do keep us posted. I am really counting on 10.7.2 for a fix.

Just to add very sorry to see Jobs resign as CEO, guess we all knew it was coming, ,my thoughts are with him and his family.

I ran 10.7.2 for the last couple of weeks but still had BSOD, so will keep you posted

Have you had the BSOD since installing the most recent seed of 10.7.2?