2011 MacBook Pro and Discrete Graphics Card

@ HeManSk

Did you go to an Apple-Store or to a Certified Repair Centre?

HeManSk wrote:

The people at Service Centre kinda rubbished the complaints made in this forum stating that at times these are simply rumours and one intthousand machines is bound to give problems. ..

This could be true, how many MacBooks have been sold in 2011?

But on the other hand the problem is just evolving, have a look at the iMac issue (https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3194165?start=0&tstart=0), which started Jul 21, 2011 and took two years until Apple started a 'Replacement Program' http://support.apple.com/kb/TS5167?viewlocale=en_US&locale=en_US (Last Modified: Aug 19, 2013)

Sorry guys, there is still a long way to go… 😢

Enjoy your 

Hi again, I've read in another forum that is very important that we all write to apple through here: http://www.apple.com/feedback/macbookpro.html

so they start taking into account the amount of cases.

I have started doing this. Everyday One post in the feedback form i guess if every one writes everyday on the feedback form here

http://www.apple.com/feedback/macbookpro.html

Subject : 2011 MacBook Pro and Graphic Card Issue

Atleast we get some reply.

Game_mil wrote:

You have some valid points but you seem to be defending Apple more than the customer who purchased a Mac expecting quality (that's why we pay >$3000). It is unacceptable that Apple, a company that states that Macs are the best laptops, forces their customers to pay $300-$600 for a temporary fix. Also they've had months to fix this. So they have to step up their games and acknowledge that they sold us faulty macbook pro's. That is the least they can do for their fans. Cannot enjoy my Mac because mine won't even pass login screen.

Game_mil

Re: 2011 MacBook Pro and Discrete Graphics Card

Nov 29, 2013 5:02 AM ( in response to abelliveau)

OMG. Today my MacBook Pro early 2011 had this issue. Now it won't boot at all. Paid $3,300 with some money I saved and now I get this. I've always been an Apple fan and I cannot beleive that with all these posts they have not yet issued a replacement program. This is unbelieveable. I always had faith that apple cared for their customers and that they had high standards for their products. I have every apple product from iPhone to now iPad because Mac seems dead. Please Apple please take action!

This are actually the post I'm talking about… you complain "Cannot enjoy my Mac because mine won't even pass login screen", but even in your original post you don't give us any information (except you have a MBP 2011) so do you expect any help or do you just want to post your anger?

To give you some help we need more INFOS.

Are you always just make a phone call to your doctor and tell him "I'm sick"… what would you expect to be the answer?

Enjoy your 

One last post about the 2008 macbook pro GPU resolution:

«Apple has posted details of a new service program for MacBook Pro laptops affected by a flaw involving Nvidia graphics chips. It’s also offering to reimburse customers who have already paid for a fix.Over the summer Nvidia acknowledged a problem in the package of some of its graphics chips that caused a higher-than-normal rate of failure. The company took a $200 million charge against earnings to cover warranty costs associated with the problem; Nvidia’s stock took a big hit over the news»

source : http://www.macworld.com/article/1136002/nvidia.html

and the official apple support page that mentionned that affected macbook were covered 4 years after purchase and repair reimbursed:

source : http://support.apple.com/kb/TS2377

@ Fernando Lobos

Fernando Lobos wrote:

@applepower maybe I missed some info that you may need to understand what i'm talking about.

Here in Chile, there are no apple stores, there are resellers. There are not apple "geniuses" there are only authorized services that will charge you at least those $50 I mentioned, just to take your computer with their barely hands. For those same reasons if you pay $300-$500 per a replacement of your logic board, you have to add shipping, taxes and labor, and the final price is around $1200.

Ridiculous? I agree. The 2013 macbook pro retail price in Chile is $1900.

When I bought my 2011 macbook pro, I paid a several bills over other computer with similar configuration to avoid this kind of problems.

There's a lot of people here who's not available to pay $300 to get another faulty logic board, I hope you can open your shutted apple's fanboy's eyes to see that it's not fair to pay $1200 for this issue, and on the other hand you can do your math about what average number represents the broken macbooks against all units sold, but it's wrong, since you can't estimate the number of people with the same issue whose are not reporting it here, and the issues about to come.

Finally, it should be nice to troll in this forum while you're not having this issue.

Have you contacted Apple Support directly? http://www.apple.com/support/macbookpro/contact/

$1200 sure is a hefty price…

And you are wrong, I'm also having this problem.

Enjoy your 

guaranna wrote:

One last post about the 2008 macbook pro GPU resolution:

«Apple has posted details of a new service program for MacBook Pro laptops affected by a flaw involving Nvidia graphics chips. It’s also offering to reimburse customers who have already paid for a fix.Over the summer Nvidia acknowledged a problem in the package of some of its graphics chips that caused a higher-than-normal rate of failure. The company took a $200 million charge against earnings to cover warranty costs associated with the problem; Nvidia’s stock took a big hit over the news»

source : http://www.macworld.com/article/1136002/nvidia.html

and the official apple support page that mentionned that affected macbook were covered 4 years after purchase and repair reimbursed:

source : http://support.apple.com/kb/TS2377

Thanks for the post, what do we learn from that?

Yes… Apple does care.

Enjoy your 

apple_power wrote:

Game_mil

Dec 2, 2013 12:20 AM ( in response to apple_power)

Do you work for Apple? I'm starting to believe you do.

No I'm not working for Apple…

Enjoy your 

He said no, I guess we have to believe him. Apple product is the greatest

*whisper* send my apple gift card to my address.

I switched to Mac because of three reasons:

1) I work as a software developer.

2) I have a rock band.

3) I also work as a freelance photographer.

I really love Linux, but 2) and 3) are really complicated on that OS. I despise Windows, which could provide 2) and 3), so I decided to go buy the expensive thing.

I've had two MacBook Pros. Zero issues with the first one (13'' Core 2 Duo) so I decided to step up and go with a 15'' i7 Macbook Pro (Early 2011 model, with the ATI 6750m discrete card. Serial number C02F944YDF8X). Problems appeared right away:

1) The audio jack got loose. I have bought a $2000USD computer that has a 3.5'' jack that was worse than the one you can find in a $20USD radio. There was no way to get a cable to stay inside the jack, the minor movement lifted it off from the jack. Really useful in rehearsals (we used the Mac to trigger Reason loops). Not to mention the stage. This is, actually, old news: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_W0rhmzMgBo. (more than 60,000 views!).

2) The memory card slot stopped working. Again, something that flawlessly works in most $20USD adapters you can buy in any tech store. Since then, I had to carry my external SD card slot everywhere. Not the worst problem in the world, but indeed an annoying one. This is, again, old news: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nbc0l-t3f1Q (almost 130,000 views!!).

3) Random glitches. The first thing I did after buying the laptop, was to update it with a hybrid Seagate Momentus XT 500GB disc. I had used my first MBP with that disk with excellent results, hence I didn't hesitate to buy a second one. To my surprise, every 8 or 10 hours, the Spinning Beach Ball of Dead would appear, and I was eager to blame the disc for that, since I could still perform tasks that did not require disk access. But later on, I discovered that it was the first symptom of something way, way worse.

-----> ISSUE NUMBER 4 <-----

This issue needs no introduction. It is widely known in the Apple community, so I'll just post the relevant links for you to refer to:

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/4766577?start=0&tstart=0 (119 pages!)

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/4637833?start=0&tstart=0 ( 11 pages)

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/2768351?start=0&tstart=0 (144 pages!)

There's even a site set up in order to raise awareness on this issue:

http://www.mbp2011.com/

And a poll in order to gather data from the affected customers:

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1PuJ2QS2Ri7fw9HVaNHLQ4OYZCb99zonc96HmhTWEAoY/vie wform

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AsGSu8v7DhVUdFNtRzUtRVFIeE50ajJyTWJ yeVRzNVE#gid=0

Let me just address the key issues about this:

1.- Flawed design makes the Mac overheat and this leads the ATI card to stop functioning.

2.- Things go from infrequent hangs to distorted video, and they always result on the same outcome: the Mac ceases to boot, either temporarily or permanently. Most users (including myself) end up with an useless Mac that won't even boot.

3.- In most cases, issues appear after 2 years of usage, which is out of the original warranty in most cases.

4.- Users reporting to Apple got their logic boards changed (prices ranging from $530USD to $1200USD depending on the country). Almost all users reported that the replacement board only solved the issue for a couple months. Something that strengthens the idea that the design of this Mac is flawed.

5.- 0 people got a replacement Mac from Apple after reporting this issue.

6.- There are no intentions of Apple to issue a recall program for this.

7.- Known affected users are more than 300.

8.- This only occurs in certain top-of-the-line products.

Conclusion:

How come a brand like Apple forget about the main reason most people switched over to Mac in the first place?

We want the best quality. We are not afraid to paid the ridiculously high prices Apple sells their machines for.

We are professionals. We're not spoiled kids taking selfies on their iPhones. We're making Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, GitHub and all the apps that makes the computing world go round.

We're composing music and playing it live on Macs.

We're selling our photographs after editing them in our Macs.

And all we get is some mediocre hardware (performance never excelled on this machine, the i5 Lenovo ThinkPad Edge E430 running Ubuntu that I have at work outperforms my Mac every single time) that can't even hold for 2 (yes, two) years.

Furthermore, Apple is refusing to acknowledge this issue and to provide a feasible solution.

Final words:

I worked a lot to finally get a Mac.

This is what I have now: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihoYFWq2LpE

I was curious, so I looked into the discussion groups about the iMac 27" 6970 problem reports.

This may be one going back to Sept 23, 2011.

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3342004

If so, I am sure that owner was beside himself as the 'fix' didn't arrive for nearly 2 years.

Our problem is complex, in the sense that mine actually began failing some time ago, I now realize... well before it became a critical problem. In fact my system would lock up and crash going way-back into 2011. I am a careful but heavy user and there were many-many days I had 16-18 hours on the notebook; I assumed it was just life; I am now convinced it was GPU lockup of some kind.

Even when the computer became unusable, I was getting improper diagnosis or none at all.... from no less than 3 different trained and authorized repair centers. If the hands-on techs couldn't 'get it'; the notion that the Apple exec who must make such decisions, and then run it by lawyers, is somehow sitting there all-knowing is simply not true (IMHO).

I mentioned that this is, of course, a business and economic decision for Apple; the idea that the cost of it is a problem for them is amusing. Not only that, they can expense it all. This is about getting the proper attention from the proper person(s) at the proper moment.

Apple could take 1000 refurb motherboards and sent them to a reball shop(s) for nickels; getting them to see that is the right thing to do (assuming its the permanent fix) is what we can all only hope for.

Color me stupid; I still have faith this will be resolved.

i also have my early 2011 15" MBP... purchase on dec 28, 2011...

since april 2013.. the intermitten screen begin occured...

finnaly for last 6 months i frequently used the external screen ( must buy vga connector ) when the screen become blank on my MBP, i still see on external screen.. sometimes need a long time to got back to MBP screen become alive again.

two weeks ago the MBP hanging... must be force to power off.. when power on again the apple screen become pink and keep loading... cant boot to the system...

alt-d and ctrl P R only can be access, but cant boot to the system..

Finally i buy the new mid 2012 13" MBP.. the old 15"MBP hard drive i move to the new 13" MBP.. and everything can run normally... ( some license cant work )....

then i left the old MBP on the local mac service centre which i buy the new 13" MBP...

after one week they inform me that the VGA chipset is failed ( AMD Radeon )....

and it cost me 600$ - 7.500.000 indonesian rupiahs ...

i thinks its too expensive for MBP that i only happy to used within 13 month only... and the last 6 month is use with suffering .. many times screen blank...and must use external monitor...

i still have my toshiba working fine almost 7 years until now.. except the battery live...

now i join to this forum thread...

with a hope... that the intermitten for 15" MBP early 2011 become common problem like on mid-2010

http://support.apple.com/kb/TS4088?viewlocale=en_US&locale=en_US

i already try all of the suggestion on many thread...until the MBP become dead two weeks ago...

what can else i can do for this issue..., maybe need to post complain to apple ... please give me a suggestion..

thanks....

Hi abelliveau,

I have the same model,an early 2011 15" MacBook Pro (2.2 GHz, Intel Core i7, 16GB 1333 MHz DDR3 memory running OS X 10.9 (Mavericks). with 2 Graphics components: AMD Radeon HD 6750M and an Intel HD Graphics 3000,

My problem started a couple of weeks ago when all of a sudden the screen turned bright blue and would freeze. Had to force restart the computer and I would get a grey screen with the Apple logo and the spinning cog and after a while they would both disappear and be left with a grey screen and the fans going wild but nothing happening.

Tried to restart in safe mode but nothing. After about 4 attempts the computer would start....

Not for long... the dreaded bright blue or a grey screen would appear again so back to restarting the machine over and over again.

Have also done a NVRAM/PRAM reset but nothing seems to solve the problem

I have tried disabling the Automatic graphics switching. It had worked fine for a day but today I had the bright blue screen 3 times and when I tried to save a document I got the two images as reported by "abelliveau" ,

with the screen split in two with the left side of the screen on the right and viceversa.

See: http://imageshack.us/a/imag145/9898/screenshot20130201at758.png

Got the dreaded bright blue screen as I was writing this post.

It's about time Apple recognises these models have a problem and the GPU is defective. There is enough evidence to prove it (although they don't want to admit it) Not only in this thread but others like mactrast.com, everymac.com, etc.

They have over 130 pages of complaints about the same problem. How can they say it's an unknown problem??

Maybe we should all avail ourselves of the EU wide consumer law which provide statutory warranty rights in addition to the coverage receive from the one year limited warranty or the optional AppleCare Protection Plan.

Also in the UK if a product is defective consumers may, in addition to any other rights which they may

have under consumer law in the UK and Ireland, avail themselves of the rights contained the Sale of Goods Act 1979 (in particular Section 12), the Supply of Goods and Services Act 1982 (in particular Section 2) and the Sale and Supply of Goods to Consumers Regulations 2002

And it's also very clearly stated in the Apple webpage: AppleCare Protection Plan

benefits are in addition to a consumer’s right to a free of charge repair or replacement,

by the seller, of goods which do not conform with the contract of sale. Under English law,

consumers have up to six years from the date of delivery to exercise their rights however,

various factors may impact your eligibility to receive these remedies.

For more details,

http://store.apple.com/uk/buy-mac/macbook-pro?product=ME293B/A&step=config

So there Apple, why don't you do a recall like you did with the defective hard drives on the iMac.

These MBP cost enough money and you shouldn't expect the consumer to fork out another £300 or £400 in order to get a useable machine.

So many things to respond to.

1. Ok firstly have you had a look here?

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3194165?answerId=18398448022#18398448022

Some guy flashed his radeon GPU bios and fixed his issues. You mentioned booting in windows, so perhaps you've looked at that?

2. Like many others, I don't experience the issue with Automatic Graphics Switching disabled.

I will concede my overzealousness in calling it Mavericks issue per se. (in my case it was, but clearly others have been experiencing it for some time on other OS's).

I'm still sure it is a software/firmware one however.

3. I'd really be curious to know if we are of course talking about the same bug. For me I've experienced these two the most:

- moved screen http://imageshack.us/a/img26/9898/screenshot20130201at758.png

- horizontal distortion - like thishttp://imageshack.us/a/img145/9898/screenshot20130201at758.png

The failure mode to be so repeatable, indicates maybe a firmware, or driver timing issue etc. If it was merely "oh you fried your GPU", then surely thermal damage would cause failures in different ways. Also, replacing the GPu would fix people's problems. But I've seen reports of this not being the case.

Take this chap for example:

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3199218?answerId=21863281022#21863281022

I just came across this post in another but related thread:

OSX Lion + 2011 iMac 27'' + Video = Freeze

This sums it up nicely.

Graphics Artifacting in OSX w. ATI graphics cards.

Known Systems affected.

-2010 iMac w. ATI Radeon HD 5750

-2011 iMac w. AMD Radeon HD 6970M

Other systems have been reported to experience the GPU artifacting as well. These two cards are the most known and commonly affected.

Different builds of the OS produce different results. This leads me and many others to know that this is a software problem.

Graphics artifacts are NEVER present in recovery mode and new OS installation mode?

Graphics artifacts show up on PRINT SCREENS and external displays.

Johann P recomends NEVER putting the display to sleep as this replicates the artifacts pretty quickly.

I have personally experienced the problem in later builds of 10.6 through 10.7 to 10.8 as well as many others.

Andrew Humphreys had come up with the first originally temporary solution. This involved flashing the GPU BIOS settings. The original power play settings were 157/300. In his fix the settings are changed to 400/900. Some have had limited success increasing their idle voltage from 0.95v to 0.96, 0.97 or 0.98. Personally I increased my voltage to 0.98. All of the information on this fix is originally documented at this link.https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3194165?answerId=18398448022#18398448022 (It should be noted that this fix is only a temporary solution. That may last weeks or months.)

The two main Apple support threads documenting these problems are:

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3194165?start=0&tstart=0

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3199218?start=0&tstart=0

Apple has been made aware of this problem on separate accounts. I have personally contacted apple by sending an email directly to Tim Cook. I had then been contacted by an Apple executive representative and support technician who were working with apple engineers. At first they seemed very interested in my specific problem. They had even originally agreed with me that this must be software related. After a few days with no new answer Apple’s “Engineers” concluded that it was hardware related. They had wanted me to take my machine to an apple store to replace my GPU. I disagreed with them and did not take my machine in. The reason for not taking in my machine was because it was my main computer needed for work and I could not be without it for the estimated 4 days of service time. I also was reluctant to bring my machine in for a graphics card replacement because many users in the support thread have done the same to no avail. Many users experiencing this problem before me have had their GPU, PSU, Logic board, and Display replaced and have noted that the artifacting/graphics problems still existed.

All in all the problem is either error in design or driver related. These ATI cards are not agreeing with OSX after extended amounts of time and someone does not want to admit this.

I would like to compile as much information on this subject to help the users experiencing these problems as well as lead people away from buying any machines with the problematic ATI cards.

My Personal notes on 27” iMac w/ ATI Radeon 5750HD running in OSX.

Andrew Humphrey’s Original Fix (This fix only lasted a few months.)

GPU flash of power play settings from 157/300 to 400/900.

Also voltage increases from 0.95v to 0.98v

Print screens show artifacts as well as external displays

10.6 (This is where I originally experienced the artifacting. at this point in time I did not take notes on the builds that were affected.)

10.7 (Artifacting was similar to 10.6 if not better or worse. I did not take careful notes.)

10.8.0 (untested, however Andrew has reported originally that this build was stable but over time went bad.)

10.8.1 (untested)

10.8.2 (This build was stable for quite some time until an unknown problem occurred which lead to artifacting.)

-Disabling the dock magnification feature improves stability and lessens artifacting. Does not completely fix the problem. (This can probably be explained due to the immediate change in the GPU clock cycle.)

-Resolution change. Less artifacts at 1920 x 1080.

10.8.3 (completely unstable/unusable (AppleGraphicsPowerManagement.kext was introduced which undoes the original BIOS FLASH fix)

10.8.4 (I am hoping that this build will have a fix as I have heard that it is focusing on graphics)

Also I found another use like myself that only experienced it with Mavericks. Not to say it's a 10.9 issue, but just to again point to a software/driver/firmware and hardware interplay issue and not a "I fried my GPU issue"

To all those who have jumped to the last page looking for solution, Apple must know about this problem, please headover to the below link and write in your issues, and make sure to link them to this thread

http://www.apple.com/feedback/macbookpro.html

For now, im on gfxCardstatus, switching to Integrated graphics and using it like this as long as i can, if in the end im left with no choice, im really keen on going with the Logic board baking method, which seems a possible solution.

I had submitted to a local authorized service centers here (we have no apple stores in India), they had it checked and they said thats it fine. Apple sent me a test application and I sent the result image, they said its fine too. Interestingly, Ive heard it from the Service centre guy informally, and he did admit that 2011 mbps do have this issue.