Q: Graphical issues with 2011 iMac and Lion

@bobbristow, that's correct same with iStat Menus. But I think this bug exists even without SMC or iStat. On a clean install without installing SMC or iStat, I did some heavy graphics load and rendering and the machine got hotter and hotter without hearing an audible fan speed increase like I would with Snow Leopard under the same load. Apple messed something up in Lion that it doesn't read the temp sensors correctly and auto adjusts the SMC fan speed accordingly like it did in Snow Leopard. So this is a 2 part problem. GPU Driver and SMC functionality.

I'm planing to go back to Snow Leopard or should I stay and wait for the next updated, what do you think guys ?

Depends.. if a light user, maybe a plan.. if you have a lot of time invested in setting up your apps and files, probably would not hurt to clone your drive the way it is now before you switch back. Then when a fix is available.. the return trip won't be so time consuming.

right Man, maybe I'll stay for awhile. Thanks !

I had some wierd artifacts happening with the dock and launchpad.. icons jittery, not scrolling smoothly. I repaired permissions and while in DiskUtility I checked the hard drive. The system crashed. After a restart, I repeated the permissions repair and checked the hard drive again. This time all was well. I have yet to see the artifacts again. Mind you... I'm not a heavy user yet.. Haven't had the time to heat up the Graphics card.

I have a loaded iMac 27" with SSD,

Processor  3.4 GHz Intel Core i7

16 GB 1333 MHz DDR3

AMD Radeon HD 6970M 2048 MB

Mac OS X Lion 10.7.1 (11B26)

Hardware Overview:

  Model Name:          iMac

  Model Identifier:          iMac12,2

  Processor Name:          Intel Core i7

  Processor Speed:          3.4 GHz

  Number of Processors:          1

  Total Number of Cores:          4

  L2 Cache (per Core):          256 KB

  L3 Cache:          8 MB

  Memory:          16 GB

  Boot ROM Version:          IM121.0047.B0A

  SMC Version (system):          1.72f2

  Serial Number (system):          C02FV5PRDHJW

BTW.. Currently working with "Pages" and when applying Alpha to a photo, Pages crashed. I repeated this anomally 4 times in a row, both in full screen mode and regular.   hmmmm..

I will share my 4 week adventure with lion and my new iMac..

I am a new mac user, and purchased a iMac 27" 1T 1GB GPU system.

Worked flawlessly with my aftermarket OWC 16GB RAM kit in SL.

Upgraded to lion and had a number of issues with the OS interface and video display.

• Funky patterns on the finder and desktop - greyed out interlaced icons / thumbnails
• Video from 5Dmkii (h.264) would play with filickering pink horizontal bars
• Kernal Panics
• Compressor taking a very very long time ot render video files
• Black screen with rainbow wheel after wakeup

I had my system recalled for the "seagate 1T HD issue" and replaced. Still the same issues.

I had my system bench tested by apple and Beyond the box (aurthorised repairer) and the hardware checked out fine.

I could replicate the issue always, videos would always flicker green / pink.

Apple icon on the top left bar would grey out once clicked.

Finder windows become greyed out momentarily when moved from one display to the other.

I when through the chain of apple care reps right through to senior staff, no fixes thus far.

I have had my machine replaced twice. And aftermarket RAM replaced twice.

I put the stock 8GB apple ram back in my system and that improved my video and graphical issues by 80%

Then I replaced my Aftermarket OWC RAM with OWC "Samsung Chips", and that is on par with my stock apple RAM - in terms of experienced issues.

Updated Lion many times including a squeaky clean manual install and that made no difference.

It seems the only improvements I could gain was to run SL or Lion 10.7.1 with stock RAM and OWC Samsung chip (part: OWC1333SAM3S4GB x 4)

I still have issues right now, but they are less occouring.

I do however get the awake issue from sleep mode still.

Im exhausted!

same problem here on 27"Imac after installing Lion.

New Imac 2gb ram video, Apple logo is strange, and scrolling in the finder give artifacts.

Reboot and problem is gone (for a while)

Waiting for a solution !!!!!

Excactly same graphic issues here. Running iMac i7, AMD Radeon HD 6970M graphic unit.

I hope this is a known bug which apple will fix soon? Happens at random times and affects graphics mostly in the menubar, dock, widgets and other osx design elements. Log out/Log in fixes it, but only temporary.

Guess: Maybe graphic driver issues. Anybody know if Apple is working on a fix?

Same issue here, ever since Lion

iMac 27" core i7 3.4GHz AMD 6970 2GB

Apple, your faulty GPU drivers and fan controls just messed my screen up again!!! APPLE PLEASE FIX THIS NOW!! See below:

I've had the same issues. I have the 2011 27" iMac 4GB/ram1TB Seagate HDD and the 1GB

AMD Radeon HD 6970M graphic card. When I watched YouTube videosafter installing Lion, my computer would often freeze. Nothing worked. Went toapple, took a month before they decided to change my iMac completely. Theychanged the HDD, the video card and the motherboard and nothing really worked.After installing the Lion update, my computer stopped freezing but now I have agreen flickering screen (sometimes). This is my first Mac and I am so notimpressed. Was thinking about buying a macbook air to use around the house, butI think I'll wait until this problem is fixed. Very annoyed.

This is my first Mac too. I loved it before LION!!! GRRRRR. 

Yes, I've got this error too, came after Lion. Only happens when watching Youtube videos (Flash releated(?)), using Chrome. Don't know about other browsers, haven't tested. I'm also on a new Imac, the high-end 27". I too had the total freezes, but got fixed with the update, but this color issue has not. Sometimes i doesnt happens for days, but it has been happening a lot again, these last 2 days  :/ I hope they are finding a fix for it soon.

This is really frustrating! I payed 700$ for an HP and never had problems with it, and now I buy a 2000$+ computer and I have a ton of problems. I thought about reinstalling snow leapord, but I like a lot of features in Lion so I don't know what to do now... I really hope they find what is wrong with flash, because I know it's not apple related since my computer worked fine before Lion.