Q: 2011 MacBook Pro and Discrete Graphics Card

Thank you for the helpful response Richard! When I called and they ran diagnostics over the phone they verified via serial number that my machine was indeed part of that bad run of mac books with faulty graphics cards. She walked me through the diagnostics test and verified that I needed to setup an appointment at the Apple store.

I have a ton of photographs and video of the display flickering and freezing. It seems like the if I went to the genius bar on the right day and talked to the right person they would help me out.

Thank you again for the enlightened response! I'm in a tight squeeze until I get a machine working at 100%. I can't afford to pay for a bogus repair. I'll post again in a few days to let you know how everything worked out.

You might also trying getting in touch with Apple Support again.  I am sure that you thought, as indeed I would have, that the diagnosis that they had you perform was sufficient to confirm that your machine is eligible for the repair program, and the purpose of making an appointment at the Apple Store was to get it fixed under that program, not to determine again, evidently in another way, whether or not the machine is eligible.  Perhaps they will understand that.

It could be that, with the customer's help, Support can exclude machines that are not eligible, and all others can only be judged when a technician examines the machine.  If that was the point of taking your machine to the Apple Store, then I think the examination must be modified to take into account those like yours, which evidently (photos, videos!) have the video issues in question despite examination.

Keep cool!  Good luck!

Sorry to hear that. Don't do anything more with your mac because you are never going to have peace of mind even after getting "repaired". Because they'll fail again. My only advice is to buy a decent windows laptop. My 5 year old dell is running just fine apart from a few battery problems. Dell now a days is making even more good stuff with good specs and performance which cost half the price of a macbook pro. Donna why i bought this stupid mac in the first place. Never again i'm going to buy a mac even if i have enough money to bath in it. Good bye apple.

I had the motherboard of my Macbook Pro 15" replaced 6 weeks ago for this issue and today I have exactly the same problem. After this experience, I won't trust apple to fry me an egg, let alone trusting them with my computing needs.

Resisting the temptation to wax philosophical about peace of mind, I would just point out  especially to those who report that their machines that were repaired under the program are already experiencing the same video issues:  I believe Apple has a policy of exchanging machines that they have unsuccessfully tried to repair too often (three times).  So it would be to your advantage to take it or mail it back to Apple (with pictures of the problem).  Insist, politely of course, that it is eligible for the repair extension program despite having been "repaired" under it once.  I think they will understand that you will keep coming back until either the machine stays repaired or you walk out with a brand new one.

Another thought, also related to Pleasehelpyourcustomers' problem:  Some of us just recently began experiencing the video issues, whereas others have apparently lived with them for years.  I wonder whether there is a correlation between how long the machines ran without problems, whether or not they failed the diagnostics tests, and whether, once repaired, they are failing again?  I wonder whether Apple's analysis of failed boards prior to the repair extension program might have misled them to draw conclusions about the cause of the failures based on incomplete evidence, i.e., evidence that does not take into account machines that just recently failed for the first time?  If something else is causing these machine to experience the same video issues, then that would explain why they do not tend to fail diagnostic tests designed to detect only previously known causes, and why boards redesigned around the assumption of complete evidence fail on those "late bloomers."  Just a thought, not speculation.

For the record:  My late 2011 MBP 17" began experiencing the video issues just as Apple announced the repair extension program, despite having used it for some computation intensive machine learning that undoubtedly used the GPU.  I took it to my local Apple Store in Basel, Switzerland a few days before the program was due to begin.  It had already begun in the US and Canada.  When I was notified that I could pick it up the program still had not begun in Switzerland, although the revised boards must have been available by then.  When I picked up my machine I was assured that the original motherboard had been replaced by a revised one.  The original video issues have so far not recurred.

A bit of advice for those of you who are still in the trenches as I climb the ladder on my way out...persevere. I'm one of the folks who have dealt with off and on problems pretty much since the beginning of my MBP2011 ownership. I came away from many stops at Apple Stores with advice to clear out bad software or check for malware or update my system. I upgraded RAM and added an SSD. Nothing made my system stable and reliable. After a complete graphics failure in January, I embarked on a campaign toward resolution.

It was clear from the outset as I dealt with my local Apple Store that they had policies that had to be followed. I ended up with what I think is a very positive outcome, although I spent a lot of time and many trips back and forth to get there. I am now legally obligated not to disclose details of my arrangements with Apple, but I think I can safely say that after nearly 4 years of a troublesome computing experience and three months of active dialogue, I'm pretty stoked with our mutually agreed upon outcome.

After the complete graphics failure and subsequent performance inadequacies, my machine was sent out for a total of thee logic board replacements (among other repairs). While they weren't all geniuses, Apple employees were nice to me. I was nice to them. My approach - 'I have followed Apple guidelines and policies. I purchased a high end machine. I purchased the extended warranty. I have been and will continue to be a loyal customer. I need Apple to step up and recognize that I have discharged my responsibilities as a customer. I would appreciate it if Apple would discharge its responsibilities and provide me with the reliable machine I intended to purchase so that I may return to productivity.' Clearly and calmly articulate what you want them to do, and they are likely to do it. Things got worked out for me in the end. I've got fingers crossed for all you guys, too.

Since I got my logic board replaced when the replacement program went into effect in late February, I haven't followed up much on this thread but I just started seeing issues with the replacement board ("static"-like lines when switching between windows or apps). So now I'm going to start stress testing it. I have the Haven benchmark running while playing an HD movie.

I cleaned installed Yosemite a few days ago because my computer has been very slow and lagging since getting it back. Before that, I went out and bought more RAM, doubling what was already in the machine. That didn't fix the slow processing time. So I thought maybe since it's 4 years old and 2-3 OS' compounded atop one another, a clean install would help. Nope. So not only is my MBP starting to experience the same graphic issues before it completely died on me in August 2014, it's also crazy slow; to the point where I can't run more than 1 app at a time.

The "genius" at my local store said once the 90 day warranty is out, I'd no longer be able to get the logic board replaced should it fail, even if it's within the replacement program's period. Obviously, no one's 90 day warranty has expired since the replacement program has been in effect but does anyone know if they will honor the replacement program after the 90 days are up but before the end of the full replacement program ends (February 17, 2016, according to a quick Google search)?

mamihlapinatapai wrote:

 

Since I got my logic board replaced when the replacement program went into effect in late February, I haven't followed up much on this thread but I just started seeing issues with the replacement board ("static"-like lines when switching between windows or apps).

Did you experience these "static"-like lines when switching between windows or apps before the repair?

The "genius" at my local store said once the 90 day warranty is out, I'd no longer be able to get the logic board replaced should it fail, even if it's within the replacement program's period. Obviously, no one's 90 day warranty has expired since the replacement program has been in effect but does anyone know if they will honor the replacement program after the 90 days are up but before the end of the full replacement program ends (February 17, 2016, according to a quick Google search)?

The original Apple announcement of the program (https://www.apple.com/support/macbookpro-videoissues/) clearly states that Apple is going to repair affected machines.  If the problems that your machine was experiencing before the repair are sill there after the repair, then barring an Orwellian interpretation of the word, the machine was not repaired.  That said, I think you are probably going to have to restrict yourself to the video issues that are described in the cited document, i.e., the ones you were experiencing before the repair.  Other suspected problems with the new board will probably have to be dealt with within the 90 day warranty.

I would escalate the question of whether machines that were not repaired under the program (i.e., the video issues are still there after the "repair") qualify until February 17, 2016 for free repair under the program; let Apple figure out how to repair it when exchanging the motherboard does not do the trick.  However, I would stop short of insinuating that Apple is merely "flushing" affected machines through an alibi repair program that it really does not believe corrects the problem.  If that really were the case, the "geniuses" at the Genius Bars would be the last people to be so informed.

Good luck!

P.S.:  I recall a posting about a repaired machine running slowly after the repair.  It seems that something was messed up when the hard disk was reconnected to the new motherboard.  Perhaps you can find it.  At any rate, take the machines back to Apple and have them check it out.  Apple products, after all, are supposed to "just work".  You're not supposed to have to troubleshoot your Apple products.

P.P.S.:  Yes, I found it.  See jaydiem's posting near the top of page 850 in this thread.  Follow the "in response to" link to the posting about the problem.

This issue started last week on my Macbook Pro 15" 2011-early. For some reason I could only replicate the graphics issue when launching a specific program.  I could hit the keyboard command to quit the application and the display would snap back to normal and I could use otherwise use the computer as if nothing was wrong.  After doing a web search and finding this thread, I tried to overload it and was finally able to replicate the issue outside of that specific program. 

I made an appointment at the apple store for yesterday.  I was able to replicate the issue visually for the tech but it passed the first diagnostic test after running for about 10 minutes.  He ran a second test because he was able to see there was a problem and it just happened to fail immediately. 

I'll get my macbook back in 3-5 days with a new logic board free of charge.  Pain free process.  I am very lucky to have only had this issue after apple has initiated their repair program. 

Just a quick update to my previous post of March 31st.

Have just received my late 2011 15" Macbook Pro back from the AppleStore with replacement board no 2. This does indeed seem to be a brand new board, unlike the previous replacement. So far everything seems stable...time will tell if this is indeed a permanent fix!

As an aside, a short note on the process: I had maybe 3-4 dozen photos/movies of failures in progress. I also spent some time immediately before my genius appointment doing the things that caused crashes (my machine was in early stages of failure, where certain tasks are still achievable) to ensure failures could be replicated at the appointment.

The genius looked at 2 screenshots, started the test, and didn't even let it finish - pretty much accepted there was an issue, and put down 'screen shots and test failure' in the repair database 'Evidence' field. In the UK at least, screen shots do seem to be acceptable as a form of evidence - whether this needs to be supported by a test fail is not clear from my experience: I would estimate that the test had been running for less than five minutes before the genius pulled the plug.

I had a similar experience to many on this thread with my early 2011 MacBook Pro 15" running Yosemite: pixelated screen, random crashes, unable to bring the computer up in even targeted disk mode, the works. I had the logic board replaced by Apple through the relatively new program, and the computer seems more stable now (been about two months).

However, about two days after I got it back, the computer just shut down without warning while in moderate use (surfing the web) - no indication of impending shutdown, just a black screen. That's the only time it has done that to me so far, but I have seen instances of pixelated screens, typically when I do a quick Command-Tab to or from Firefox or something with moderate to heavy graphics usage. I've also noticed that my iPhone doesn't want to charge when plugged into the machine via the USB; while I know there isn't a tremendous about of power available off USB, it was markedly slower to charge.

Most concerning is the fact that the computer is running incredibly slowly now. Apple pulled the 16 GB of RAM I had installed (per the app MacTracker, 16GB is the actual maximum this Mac can handle, though more than what the Apple specs) and replaced them with the factory amount of 4GB, claiming there were "issues" with the memory. I used to use a second display, but have stopped as the computer has become essentially unresponsive when running it.

I have two questions. First, should I send the computer back to have it looked at again? I'm questioning whether the computer was put back together correctly (no USB power?) or if another faulty logic board was installed and it's just a matter of time (probably after the limited warranty on this repair runs out) before it crashes again. Second, should I reinstall the RAM Apple pulled (and sent back with the machine) or is that going to negatively affect anything (obviously I won't install the old memory until it gets back from Apple again if I decide to do that). I appreciate your input.

A few clarifications: I took the computer to the closest Apple Store in Annapolis and had an excellent experience working with the staff at the Genius bar. They very quickly isolated the issue using their diagnostic tools; my machine "passed MRI but" immediately "failed the VST for the quality program" per my Genius Bar work authorization, so I qualified for having the logic board replaced by Apple through the MacBook Pro Repair Extension Program for Video Issues program. They took the Macbook that night and had it Fedexed to my house about five days later. 

Yes, by all means take/send it back.  Apple warrants parts and labor for ninety days, I believe.  Have them fix the problems that are related to the new motherboard, so you don't have to pay, and then see what other problems disappear ... or appear.  Just ensure beforehand that whatever problems you report are reproducible or otherwise (photographically) documented.

Good luck!

P.S.:  Regarding the lethargic response of your "repaired" machine, you might increase the RAM back to 16GB and see whether it's still slower than before the repair.  If not, then you have enough problems to refer to Apple without mentioning the speed issue.  Don't forget to switch the RAM back.

So much discussion on this threat but just one simple question maybe could not answer. Is new logic board which apple replacement by this program different with old logic board?

My macbook pro 15 inch early 2011 got new logic board but I didn't get any answer about this new logic board is same with old logic board or not.

If new logic board is different with old logic board so maybe we can have a hope that issue maybe disappear.

Several people have reported posing that question and receiving the answer that the boards being used in the repair extension program are "revised" boards.  As one person reported, who opened his repaired machine, had the impression that the board was not new, and asked Apple about this, Apple apparently uses recycled components in these (and perhaps other) repair boards.  Apple says that it is not recycling old boards.  So, regardless of how new or not new your "new" board might appear, it has never been in another MBP before yours.

In short, there is no way to predict the success of a repair performed under the current repair extension program.