problems with amd gpu on early 2011 macbook pro

I've also just noticed A LOT of posts have been deleted!!!!???

If you post a comment and link, please save them in Word, check back once a week to see if it's still here and if not, repost!

How shady is this company acting right now!!!?? This is beyond belief. What has happened to this company? No Steve Jobs seems to equal no quality control at all.

Keep applying the pressure people.

I have done all you mentioned and they have replaced my logic board, 3 times within 2 months as a matter of fact. They also replaced all the wires and cables as according to the paperwork they were visibly defective due to heat which means one thing, they were melted. They replaced the left and right fans, the airport 3 times, the optical drive 3 times, 2 times in the last two months. They pretty much gutted it inside the last two months and it did not fix anything. As a matter of fact they sent it back the third time in and called me from the "white glove" manager saying they could not reproduce the errors. I asked if they plugged in any device into the USB port next to the Thunderbolt port and he said no we only run software stress tests. I asked him to humor me and the next day I got my Macbook Pro back with the logic board replaced.

It was still not working, it freezes up, locks up, have to hard boot it at least 3 time in a row before it is stable, and I use that word very loosely. The machine has 8G RAM however it only shows 4.2G on bootup and within minutes only shows 1G or less until it shuts itself off. It also heats up and a red box flashes on the screen and the machine shuts off before I can even read it but I am assuming it is due to the heat. Now during all the above I am not doing anything, nothing is running, I just have it turned on and sitting there plugged in because the battery does not work either.

When I called to have it sent back in the “White Glove" tech, William H., told me it can not be sent back to the depot given it has been there 4 times in the last 2 months that I had to take it to the Apple store, which is a long way from where I live. I asked to speak with his supervisor and he said he was the supervisor of the white glove department but I could talk to one of the techs he manages. I asked for customer service and he said you already talked to customer service and there is nothing they can do. I called the Apple store and they said if it passes their software stress tests there is nothing they can do until whatever is wrong is so bad it shows up on their stress tests. The major issue with this is the particular issue that is going on does not show up on the stress test, however if they open the machine it becomes visible what the issues are. I asked him if he was implying the Apple Genius's (again using that word loosely) are more qualified than the people at the depot that deal with the big issues day in and day out? I said are you telling me your depot people are incompetent? He back peddled but the case is the same, he knows how far I have to go to get to the Apple Store and my warranty is nearly up and its snowing here in the mountains so I can't get to the Apple Store. So he is blowing me off basically. This is the same dude that said all the people on these boards, forums, etc are aliens trying to make trouble because there is NO ISSUE's with the machines and I am the only one having issues.

I told him he is full of crap and I know they know there is issues but simply replacing the logic board does not fix it. While the GPU may be a large part of the issue it is not the entire issue and the longer the machine is in use the damage being done on the inside can not be fixed, it is a major flaw therefore replacing the defective boards with another defective board begets the same issues in a short time. My machine was defective out of the box and I tried to return it the day it arrived and was told I will be receiving a call shortly, within a few days to setup the replacement. Nobody ever called so I called back and was told they decided to do some procedures and we are now nearing the end of the first two weeks I had it. We reinstalled the OS, reset the PRAM and every other setting that could be reset and it did not help anything. The thunderbolt dropped intermittently so I had to unplug the thunderbolt device from the Macbook Pro and plug it back in to get the screen back on my big screen. I thought it was a Dell issue originally and the kind folks over at Dell shipped me 3 brand new big screen high end monitors over night before we figured out it was not the monitor. I appreciate Dell and all they time they spent as well as the efforts they put forth to try to solve this issue. I am not a big fan of Dell however they do make some of the best monitors on the market so I do get all my monitors from Dell because I know they stand behind their monitors.

Moving forward out of the box here are the rest of the issues of course I just covered the thunderbolt dropping off, as did the firewire port and the airport. The firewire port had a external hard drive connected to it and it would drop the connection in the middle of transferring files and it would either corrupt the files or lock up before the transfer was finished which also corrupted the files. When the airport drops out I had to turn it back on in the title bar. The battery never charged to 100% and would go up and down at random times while plugged in to the power adapter. It would ready 95% then I'd look up a few minutes later and it would read 43% and constantly go up and down like that with the machine plugged in because it wouldn't hold a charge so I had to keep it plugged in at all times. When my studio equipment was plugged into the audio port it pulled in a AM radio station rather than the recordings so I had to buy a device, which was not cheap to bypass the Macbook Pro's audio card and use the devices audio card which also had the TRS connections for my studio monitor headphones and near field monitors. The device had to be plugged into the Macbook Pro USB port directly, it had its own power supply however it still required a main connection to the machine. That left me with one USB port so I had to buy a USB hub for my external drives, keyboard (the Macbook Pro keyboard did not always register the keys while typing), a USB mouse and my iPhone. 90% of the time I got a message stating there wasn't enough power for the iPhone so I had to use the wall adapter to charge it and had to buy an app that didn't require a USB connection to transfer files between my iphone and Macbook Pro. It had major over heating issues and would shut down. All of this was right out of the box and they claimed it was a corrupt installation on the assembly line however a reinstall did not fix any of the issues as if that was a believable diagnose to begin with.

They sent me a file to run and send the log file it created to them and I got back the problem was too many USB devices which of course I wouldn't have required if the firewire port worked and the audio in/out worked, and the keyboard worked.

The last time it went in was in Nov 2013 and they did nothing because it passed all their stress tests and they were not going to open it up as they did each time prior to visibly see the damage. I directed the tech, William H. to all the forums on Apple's site as well as forums and boards that Apple does not run and can't delete the posts. I also pointed him to the class action suit that was filed in Texas in 2011 that nothing has been done so far other than Apple forcing them to remove all user comments. The tech, William H., said he does not read any of the stuff posted by us aliens and trouble makers and if there were an issue Apple would own up to it as customer service is a priority and several years back that was true however not any longer. I do collect all the posts from the forums as well as this one given they come to my email and place them in a folder so all that has been erased I have in a folder.

As for the Apple Care warranty if you read the fine print Apple reserves the right to deny service. I even said I would take it to an authorized Apple dealer closer to me and he said no Apple Care will not pay for it because they will replace the logic board and its been replaced 3 times already. He kept pushing the Apple Store issue is the only way and if it passed the test then there was nothing that could be done. If he knew they would replaced the logic board and other parts then he knows there is a major issue. They also know changing the logic board does not fix the issue because so many people in so many different countries are having the same issues, many paying large sums of money to replace the logic board only to find within months the logic board fails again and its outside the 90 day warranty so they are screwed and ****** off. The only fix is to replace the machine with a different model and that would be extremely costly for Apple but so will having customers dropping them like a rock.

I have a very expensive paper weight. The last time I spoke with them after 4 months of trying to get it fixed, losing clients, etc I had a gastric bleed that landed me in the hospital. At that point I decided its not work dying over I had to cut my loses but I wasn't going away quietly I was making sure to post my story where ever there was an outlet even if it gets deleted. I also tell all my colleagues that run a music studio and photo studios which many had already begun the transfer to Windows based studios because of Apple's total disregard for their customers.

Steve Jobs is rolling in his grave at this point. If he were still here #1 it would have never gotten this far out of control and #2 he would have made sure customer service was a number one priority because let's face it without customers what good is the product you make? The word is getting out there and major companies are dropping Apple and will continue to do so. Once a company gets a bad rep from high level people that pay lots of money for a product only to be screwed by the company its **** near impossible to turn it around and I do believe Apple found that out once when Steve left and the company was near bankrupt until Steve returned and took over the helm once again. Well that isn't going to happen this time Steve can't come back and Apple will continue to spiral downward. This one issue alone is causing so much chatter and bad press it won't take much more for Apple to be cut up into pieces and turned into an apple pie gobbled up by the next big thing.

<Edited By Host>

I'm gonna keep this as short as possible and to the point:

- Early 2011, 15 in, 2 Ghz, i7 quad core

- Purchased from Apple around June 2011 with extended Apple care.

- After 10.9.2 update on 2/28/2014, my machine would not boot

- First, a gray screen after Apple-Logo screen.

- Hardware test by holding "D" at start up have me blue screen with thin vertical stripes.

- PRAM reset, same blue screen

- Holding "R" at boot got me up to WiFi login, then nada.

- Safe Mode: Again, nothing.

Took it to Apple Store that day and after 5 min they decided to send it off for repair. The ticket says "replace logic board and/or screen". The status on the web page says "repair in progress" and shows that I will not owe anything so this means they have honored the plan. I have been happy with their service, but a little nervous about the product when APP runs out.

In early Oct, I had it in for repair because my battery had swollen to the point it was pushing out my trackpad and a separate issue caused a couple of keys (important keys! The ".", left "shift" and left "cmd". They replaced the top tray and battery without any issues. The problem is, however, that this is way too many major issues in such a short period. Hopefully with it being basically a new computer by now, I won't have any more problems... Especially after protection runs out. This time without a computer is really hurtful. I work the **** out if my computer, but that's what they're built for. Run a lot of Adobe CS6 and Maya, so the processor and gpu work a lot.

I'll keep you posted. Even though I wasn't getting any flack from Apple, I wanted to show solidarity with my brothers and sisters all over the world that are experiencing these issues.

Thanks,

Weston

Also hitting a similar if not the same problem with my MacBook Pro Late-2011, 2.5GHz Core i7, 16GB RAM, AMD Radeon HD 6770M/Intel HD Graphics 3000 512 MB, OSX 10.9.2. After a random time screen gets kinda black-white interlaced and machine heats up unnecessarily, have to hard shut down afterwards. Quick hardware test shows no issues, extensive tests crashed with interlaced screen as well so far.

https://vimeo.com/88195178 Here's what my mom's MacBookPro8,2 is doing now. I've used GFXCardStatus to force it to use only the Integrated Graphics and it seems to be working, but I haven't gotten a chance to really stress it yet.

Hey,
now my MBP 8,2 early 2011 becomes the same failures as described before!

Graphical glitches, distortioned lines, no wake up from sleep, black screen (but system running)..

I become more angry from day to day - cause i hoped this model will work perfectly - it is my second Laptop from Apple and maybe the last product i bought if nothing change!

I will tell you my story from the beginning with apple:

It is my second MBP, my first was the MBP 3,1 wich had several failures during the life span - the first was the problem, that the trackpad and keyboard stoped working - i found the best provider ever who changed it fast, easy and for no money ⚠ because he know that apple got an exchange program for this problem.
If i had gone to another company, they said i have to pay for the exchange and repair.. aha.. although apple is doing it for free. Then the grphic card was broken - back to my provider, he changed the complete logicboard because apple had an excange program for the graphic problem too. But in this time apple was cool, and they knew that the production was so bad, that they made the exchange progrms for NVIDIA and the broken Trackpad/Keyboard for free. And than my trackpad and keyboard stopped working again the second time 😟. So i thought, ah no problem - exchange program.. haha no no they stopped the program after 3 years for the Trackpad/Keyboard first and than after 4 years for the graphic too: http://support.apple.com/kb/TS2377?viewlocale=en_US
Now they want € 240,- for repairing a €20,- Trackpad-cable 😠!!!!

..what a service - but they don't care about the image they lost..

Short time before i bought the 8,2 Model to get more power.
For the first Live-act with the new model i noticed some glitches in the music, but i thought it does not matter.
Last Gig (a big one) in 07.02.2014 in Hamburg - after starting the show, i had the problem the first time.

Directly after one minute the monitor turns black 😮 - so how to performe without seeing anything? Shock!!!! In the studio there was nothing like that, all was running fine and at the stage - crash!
So a DJ must save the situation that i can restart. In hope that i could play after restarting my performance.. HORROR!!!!! With all extras i spend € 3500,- to build this machine as my powerfull professional main system for 3D-Design, Illustration, music-production and music live-performance.
Now i had spend € 2700 for the MBP 3,1 & € 3500,- MBP 8,2 directly to apple.

The years before i told the world that apple is best for the stage, but now i am not sure anymore. And now i can not believe that the graphic ***** with the Model 8,2 again.

Friday last week was biggest crash while working with a band, graphics completely driving crazy, hanging, freezing, no booting after hard shutdown, all problems reported here in one short time 😠...

We must cancel the hole production this day.

I decided to update the MBP 8,2 to 10.9.2 Mavericks, cause i hoped it is a software problem this time.
After successfull updating (no clean install, and with help of old MBP),

the MBP 8,2 was running better the last days - till now.
Today i had heavy glitches again, and i had not changed to the Intel on board. I always run the AMD to have the best performances.

So it is bad to know that nobody can say what the problem really is... 😕

Why apple do not know more?

Why there is no exchange-program (the problem is known since 1 year - 2013)?

So i repeat the situation:

• MBP 8,2 early 2011 - graphic problems (first reports about this problem in 01.02.13)

• Changing OS X - does not help! (not relly only a little bit, failures coming back)
• Changing Logicboard - does not help? really???? but what else????

Then i can save senseless miles to an apple shop.

So for a would like ferrari - nobody would spend so much money 😝 !

And apple creating an image and prices that it might be the ferrari or porsche in the market - FAKE!
But Porsche does a getback action for the last machine failures - TRUE!
And apple? I hope an exchange program will come yesterday (like exchange-programs for the MBP 3,1),
with a personal email and a big sorry that they waste our time and money!

PS.:
Apple you are lost,
now everybody can see your planned obsolescence very easily at all, because you are too fast with it 😉

So sorry tatonga for your issues, it seems we are in the same business, the music industry, I am also a Photographer and Journalist so we use the same software and apps in all likelihood.

I too have had nothing but problems with my Macbook Pro's since 2006 which is when I bought my first one. Yes I was under the impression as well that Apple is the Ferrari of computers, well actually Slackware Linux is if we are talking software / hardware stability BUT it will not do what we need it to do, its great for servers but not a workstation. At that time Windows did not have the apps and software I needed to run a music studio so I did buy the top of the line Macbook Pro and it cost me around $2800 fully loaded, upgraded specs from the standard box on the shelf, and it was replaced several times for keyboard and trackpad issues as well as many other issues that I do not recall at this time where the machine just stopped working completely. Apple did have a policy when Steve was around, may he rest in peace but given what is happening at his company there is noway he is resting peacefully, if the computer had to be serviced for the same issue three times or more it was automatically replaced, if it was DOA it was replaced immediately. Well that is not the case any longer my current Macbook Pro early 2011 model with special build, additional RAM, 7200 RPM HD, 1G on video card, etc costing $3500 was DOA but they refused to replace it even though I called in the day I received it. According to attorney's the machine should have been replaced given it was a DOA with so many issues it not only cost me a fortune to buy extra equipment to work around the issues that Apple claimed had no issues, but it also caused me a lot of precious time, lost clients, as well as a gastric bleed that put me in the hospital after a "white Glove" tech refused to honor my Apple Care if I did not jump through hoops. The hoops would just push me past my warranty time then they would have been off the hook when the 4th logic board died after its 90 day warranty, or it caused other issues, which it does and they could say we didn't replace that part so its not under warranty.

We are not stupid people, most of us are all professional people and it does not take much to figure out if a part has been replaced 3 times or more then the entire line (model) is defective so replacing a defective part with yet another defective part equals the very same issues. I also am a Mechanical Engineer and Network Systems Engineer so computers are like child’s play to me however Apple is propriety system and given I retired from that industry I don't expect I should have to fix my own computer that is what Apple Care is supposed to be covering so I can work without having to deal with computer related repairs on my time.

This early 2011 Macbook Pro, if you have been following this thread and Apple didn't delete my comment, hold on let me check... oh they did not delete it but they EDITED IT! ***? I have a copy of what I wrote and most of us are on other board that Apple does not control that has read the original that I wrote including Facebook as well as a new website I am building. While the website is based around musicians and others in the industry I believe this will fail into that category given we tend to use Mac's the most, as well as Journalist and photographers. The site is not up yet but the name of it is http://www.musiciansbeware.com. It is a collaboration between myself and Miljenko Matijevic, who by the way won't even think of buying a iPhone and he just replaced his Mac and found that Apple as we knew it is no longer the same so he isn't using it much he travels with his Toshiba that is old and works very solid. At least we can keep in contact while he is out of the country which is important since I am the Publicist, Press Agent, Public Relations, and whatever else they need done for Steelheart and Miljenko Matijevic. While Skype is touchy no matter what computer a person uses it does seem to be much more stable on Windows to Windows conversations. On a Macbook Pro forget it the connection dropped constantly and when the band was outside the US in oh say Korea, Sweden, Peru, etc it is imperative for us to be able to communicate and email just don't cut it at times especially if it is a pressing matter. I swore I'd never own a Windows machine due to the OS instability however I did buy a Toshiba just over a month ago, and one by one as my Mac's die they will be replaced with a Windows machine. My iPhone was just replaced with a Droid Maxx and I read an article today that android tablets surpassed the iPad in 2013. I do believe people are sick of playing the Apple blame game like a high stakes poker game.

I have the Macbook Pro booted up and nothing is running and for a machine with 8G of RAM in it the monitor only shows 1G and before long it will pop a big red box on the screen about the RAM then shut itself off. It gets so hot even while on an industrial dual fan cooling system yet the fans are not even making a sound and they were replace Oct 2013, both the left and right fans.

As for Apple planned obsolescence they do have it just about timed exactly when Apple Care would run out as most people begin having issues after 2 1/2 years, mine was a little different I had major issues on arrival. I agree though they are trying to cover up a massive issue/flaw in the design.

I do not know what the answer is but I do know we can't take it laying down. Tell your story to as many as possible and every forum and board you find post it. If it makes it easier for you cut and paste your post so it is simple to post where ever there is an outlet to post it. As for Apple run forums if you see at the bottom of the post <edited by host> then Apple edited the post so what you are reading is not exactly what the poster wrote, so watch for that.

On a final note, I bought a iMac at the same time with the same specs with the exception it is a i5 versus and i7. It has sat in the corner for the last 2 1/2 years because the last iMac I had over heated so I was told to take it to the Apple Store because they do not ship them to the depot. I had no choice but to make that trip and when I got there my appointment was near closing time and the store was packed with people many were walk ins without an appointment so I sat there for near two hours after my appointment before they even got to me and by then the store was closing. They ran the hardware test and it passed so they said there was nothing they could do, there was nowhere to start without it failing the test. I took it in because I burned my arm on it when moving it and the power cord was hot. I downloaded iStat pro and it was running reaching 200 degrees F quite frequently and shutting off, I was afraid of a fire. The tech told me well if it catches on fire you have Apple Care so they will replace it and I said well that is all fine and dandy but what about everything in my studio including myself since I sleep in my studio many nights when working and the reply was all we are responsible for is the iMac.

Several months later it did have an electrical meltdown and the power cable was so hot I burned my hand yanking it out of the battery backup with a built in surge protector, professional grade. Had I not been right there at that time no telling what could have happened. They did replace the machine but I didn't trust it so I didn't use it until now since I needed it because my Macbook Pro has been down since August 2013. In the last week all the issues that I have had with my Macbook Pro is now happening on my iMac with the same specs. It locks up and I have to hard boot it, usually 3 or 4 times before it has a good solid boot but that is getting less and less. I reinstalled the OS, did not help, did all the resets, still no change, upgraded to the latest version of Mavericks 10.9.2 and it made it worse. I have to hard boot it 90% of the time because its locked up and while booting up it takes so long I can use the rest room, grab a snack and come back and it is still not at the login screen. So I reboot it normally 3 or 4 times until it starts up a little faster yet most of my folders have only dotted lines around what it supposed to be a blue folder be it local or a network drive or an external drive connected to the a USB port locally. So this issue is not limited to Macbook Pro's it is ALL computers made at that time using the same logic board / GPU early 2011 computers.

Keep spreading the word, don't give up until Apple replaces the entire machine because replacing the logic board does not fix the issue. Don't buy Apple products, force them to own up to the error of their ways and fix it. Yes it is less convenient owning a Droid phone because it does not sync up automatically with the cloud like my iPhone 4S but a little inconvenience is better than expensive paper weights. I can’t in good consciences allow Apple to grow by continuing to buying their products. A world wide boycott on Apple might wake them up!

My MacBook Pro 15" 2011 has this problem. The software is up to date but I see pixelate text, icons and when I scroll just a web page it leaves lines on the screen. This mac has problem since I bought it. I already change the hhd because of a noise, but this problem has never gone away. Now I have problem with the graphic card, lines, strange colors when I scroll ecc.... I'm very angry because is my second Mac, but it has just two years. I'm a graphic designer and this is causing me a lot of problem.

Yes thats the point i forgot!
As independent designer and liva act its for me the same 😠

We become more and more in trouble from day to day..

Who will pay the lost time when the main machine will crash completly????

Or when a complete project is running out of deadline????

Sorry but i need to write this down.. cheers and good success for all of you!

Early Macbook Pro 2011 w' matte screen. Original OS, only updates have been RAM to 16GB.

Replaced Ram back to original 4GB, ran all trials - same problem.

Daily Photoshop & After Effects work.

Same Kernalling Issues varying levels of broken displays (a few attached).

Out of Warranty.

This has happened to three of my machines now, 2 Tower G5's (2005 & 2008), each 1-4 months out of old apple care warranty, each one's HD or boot disk failed, the second Tower, apple technician couldn't even diagonose what the problem was, each one had to be recycled due to the expense of the parts to replace and not be guaranteed a fully working machine)

Purchased: Bondi Junction Apple Store, April 2011 for $2999.00.

Another Failed Apple Product...!

and posted here:

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/4766577?start=3525&tstart=0

Same problem. MacBook Pro 15-inch, Early 2011.

It does not even boot!😠

On Friday, 28th of February 2014, my MBP crashed. I thought it was the HDD again as I have replaced my HDD twice already. The first time was 3 months after purchase in July 2011 and the second time was in August 2013. I managed to reboot my MBP using the different key combinations and was able to do a disk check and found that my latest HDD is working fine. And then on Monday, 3rd of March 2014, my MBP crashed again twice and I was able to reboot again using the different key combinations. It was running OK for the next few days until it crashed again last night. I was able to reboot again and shut it down after using it for a few minutes. Thinking that all is good, I turned on the MBP today and unfortunately, my MBP refuses to reboot anymore.

I have gone online and read up on numerous threads and just found out that the same problem is happening to so many people with early 2011 MBPs around the world. I guess this means that my MBP is doomed. I hope Apple will take some action and offer us a replacement program that will be worth our while. After all, we spent so much money on our machines. I think we deserve to be taken seriously this time.

Apple had to replace the logic board to resolve my issue. It worked for one day. I went to restart it and got a message that said "Unapproved Caller. SecurityAgent may only be invoked by Apple software." This is quite an unfortunate predicament. I cannot even begin to imagine what I would be dealing with if it was not covered under warranty.

It just happened to my MBP early 2011 17 inch. When i opened Photoshop.. I'm on OSX Mavericks 10.9

Tried everything that any forums could advice but no luck. To be honest, i hate the fact of solution like 'Take it to Apple Service..blah blah' Sorry to say, It's not helping at all.. If you still on Apple Care then your in luck.

Then i found these article that clears everything: http://www.mactrast.com/2013/10/owners-early-2011-macbook-pro/

My question is: Why the **** this happens after nearly 3 years of using my macbook? What Apple would do about this? NONE. We're on our own, and leaves us high repair cost. Unless you want to repair it by yourself you can have a new working logic board replacement cheaper with Exchange Service (you send your defective parts to them) http://www.ebay.com/bhp/macbook-pro-17-logic-board

Same problem here, early 2011 mbp 15 with AMD6750M