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Macbook Pro screen becomes blue every time a discrete graphics card is used!

The screen color of my 2011 17" Macbook Pro changes to blue-ish every time the discrete graphics card is used! That started to happen only after I upgraded to OS Mountain Lion!


Whenever I open any app that use Discrete graphics card by default, the screen becomes blue and looks terrible.. Applications include, VLC, Chrome (20.0) and I guess quite a few others!


So now efectively my Macbook Pro has just one usable video-card - the buit in one, because the discrete card (AMD Radeon HD 6750M) is not usable!


Here's some other forums set up about this problem, so it's not just me:

http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=1401741

http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=1392978


***..!? Apple, please fix this ASAP!!!

MacBook Pro (17-inch Early 2011), OS X Mountain Lion

Posted on Jul 27, 2012 8:35 AM

Reply
133 replies

Mar 14, 2013 10:24 AM in response to cmdrfletcher

Turing off automatic graphics switching in energy saver prefs is the only thing that solved this problem for me. It is consistently reproducible with the graphics switching set to "on" so it is not a hardware problem (to my relief). I run 10.6.8 so any ML solutions are not going to help me. I'd wish that Apple would address this and also the problem with invalid file count and needing to repair the disk frequently... A LOT of people I know still run 10.6.8 for professional audio and composition work and are not going to upgrade the OS any time soon. Oh well :s

Mar 21, 2013 10:22 AM in response to mrtsk

Well, the problem is back for me. I removed my Intel 320 120GB SATA2 SSD and installed a Crucial M4 SATA3 256GB SSD. I then enabled FileVault. LOTS of blue tint jumpiness happening during the FileVault disk encryption. Now when I open up a large Ps file, the screen turns blue. Logging out/in solved the problem temporarily, but this is getting quite annoying for such a high-end laptop.


http://youtu.be/VdU9FFTlvFs

Apr 17, 2013 12:19 PM in response to MichiStichi

there is no mentioned workaround here, which solved the problem, other than using login and password when booting. i never used login and password when booting, but since i use it, i didnt have a blue screen problem anymore. i can provoke it clearly, when i turn on login&password in system settings in 10.8.3 - then i get a bluescreen, when starting adobe photoshop CS6 instantly.


i never had this problem earlier on 10.7 or 10.6 and so on. apple didnt fix it. why?


so, this permanent workaround (which is slightly annoying) solved the problem for 100%: turn on login and password in system settings. (under system>user)


thanks for your help and time!

Apr 22, 2013 9:27 AM in response to mrtsk

I have the same problem with OS X 10.8.3 .

Nothing works for longer than 3 restarts.


Reinstalling latest OS X update

Reinstalling Flash

Deleted the ~/Library/ColorSync



Of course deaktivating 'automatic graphics switching' works. But then the battery duration is much lower, the mainboard gpu is then never used.

Apr 24, 2013 12:28 PM in response to mrtsk

Has anyone taken their MacBook Pro to an Apple Store to get Apple's response to this? There was one post in this thread about someone taking to the store and being told "We're working on it", but that won't cut it for me. I didn't get the top-of-the-line 17" MacBook Pro so that I could log out / log in every time I boot the thing.


If no one else has gone to an Apple Store, I'll probably take mine in this week. It has gotten to the point where without fail, every time I reboot, it will absolutely go back and forth between blue tint and regular color profile when launching graphics-heavy applications.

Apr 30, 2013 5:26 PM in response to mrtsk

I'm encountering the same issue with my MPB Early 2011. This issue happens both in OSX and Bootcamp: Windows 7. I suspect what's happening here is the descrete graphics card is fried. I'm looking good on the integrated intel graphics card untill the system makes the switch over. If this is indeed a hardware issue, the whole logicboard will need to be replaced.


Going to reinstall OSX and see how it goes...

May 29, 2013 12:03 PM in response to mrtsk

i have found the problem !


after mounth of suffering i made a clean install, few day it was ok, but just now i see it again, so i tought to myself "what did i installed today?" and the answer was Aperture. So i removed aperture witha app for cleaning aditional files like http://www.freemacsoft.net/appcleaner/ (dont just drag Aperture to the trash you need to get everithing related out) and it worked for me ! Tell me if it works for you ! Regards !

May 29, 2013 2:38 PM in response to iViktorDimitrow

It is NOT an Aperture issue, infact, it's not associated with any software. It's the OS/firmware thats cauing issue. Any application thats going to use the descrete graphics will trigger the issue.


Temperarly solution: everytime you power up the MBP, you log out immidiately then log back into your account. The issue will dissappear even if you put the macbook pro to sleep, until you power off and power on again.


A goodway to monitor what applications uses the descrete graphics chip or not is to install gfxCardStatus in your menu bar. it has a indicater what chip is being utilized at the moment and what application is using it.

May 29, 2013 2:38 PM in response to aDoorMouse

It is NOT an Aperture issue, infact, it's not associated with any software. It's the OSX 10.8/firmware thats cauing issue. Any application thats going to use the descrete graphics will trigger the issue.


Temperarly solution: everytime you power up the MBP, you log out immidiately then log back into your account. The issue will dissappear even if you put the macbook pro to sleep, until you power off and power on again.


A goodway to monitor what applications uses the descrete graphics chip or not is to install gfxCardStatus in your menu bar. it has a indicater what chip is being utilized at the moment and what application is using it.

May 29, 2013 2:50 PM in response to mrtsk

I solved the problem, but the solution is far from ideal. I erased my SSD and reinstalled 10.8.3 from scratch, and i DID NOT ENABLE FileVault 2. It appeared that the issue stemmed from having FV2 active on an SSD, and since I turned FileVault off, I don't really count this as a solution.


FileVault was causing a lot of other performance issues on my 17" MBP, so I decided that creating individually encrypted volumes for storing important data was a better solution for me than crippling my device on many fronts.


I hope Apple fixes this soon!

Macbook Pro screen becomes blue every time a discrete graphics card is used!

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