Q: 2011 MacBook Pro and Discrete Graphics Card

Guys,finally my MacBook Pro 2011 with 6750 AMD GPU is dead :( It is no longer booting,I cannot even see the distorted Apple Logo now.All I can see is, blank screen & then the noise of the fan rotating like ****.

History:- The issue first popped up in August 2013 exactly 2 years after the purchase date. I was running boot camp Windows 7 all these years.Went to the Shanghai Pudong Apple Store,Genius quoted a 5k RMB logic board replacement fee, I said Thanks but No Thanks!!I had to forcefully switch to Mac OS with integrated GPU using gfxcard application.I would refuse to shut it down for weeks and some how managed to use it for web browsing and stuff.I even installed the Mavericks OS ,which obviously is more intensive and made the Core temperature hit high 70's.

I can get is repaired by local technicians here but thinking Apple might surprise and throw a replacement program!

I had registered a feedback in August itself..Hoping for the best.

Anyone who is facing the same blank screen death behavior?

Thanks.

@ Rache81

I would advice you to go to the  Apple Store an talk to the people there, tell them that you are very much frustrated about the quality of diagnosis and repair. A good engineer or genius would have got strait to the point to replace the mother board. And now they ask for some more money to replace an other part? That is lousy.

If they wont fix it for the price you agreed, then ask for the manager and talk to him. Don't forget to write down the names of the people you speak to.

If the conversation with the manager does not help, ask him to give you an eMail address or phone number of an customer related department in Cupertino where you can escalate the whole issue.

And please stay always friendly but defend your point of view, that you have agreed to pay for a mother board replacement and expecting for that money to have a working computer. It is not your fault that these guys don't know how to diagnose a failure, but they really should be qualified for that.

So if you don't get further in the store, you have to write or call Cupertino. Let them know, that you get a bad experience when these guys diagnose a software problem in the first place, so starting from 0£ to 500£ and then 900£« whats next?

I would suggest writing, because it takes out tension and you won't forget important points in your argumentation, don't forget to be as accurate as possible use dates time and names of the persons you spoke to.

Enjoy your 

@China_MACer

Have you tried to boot in SAFE mode? holding the shift key as soon as you here the boot sound.

What do you see when you boot while holding the "alt" key?

Enjoy your 

Hello,

The screen is just blank....whatever I try to do. I hope the display is alrite!!!

Thanks.

China_MACer wrote:

 

Hello,

The screen is just blank....whatever I try to do. I hope the display is alrite!!!

Thanks.

I guess your Mac is just in sleep mode (that changed in Maverick, if you just hit the ON/OFF it is going to sleep), press and hold the ON/OFF switch for 7 or 8 seconds, then start it normally.

Enjoy your 

this has always worked for me:

whenever you get a bad screen (grayscreen/bluescreen/blackscreen/splitscreen/etc.) I always do a force shutdown followed immediately by a safe mode boot (hold the shift key down). About 50% of the time the so-called safe boot leads to a blackscreen (either immediately before login or immediately after). No matter. Do another forced shutdown and let it boot normally. On rare occasions I had to do that a couple of times, but it usually took the first go-around.

Once booted, I always shut all my software programs down (especially facebook -- I'm convinced that it is just a big virus that is playing with the insides of our machines but I can't prove it, yet), then I restart again.

One thing I've noticed since my screen went berserk: shutting down takes an inordinate amount of time. Sometimes as long as 5 minutes. And this even with a clean install. There is something to this, but I'm not sure what.

Michael

Whatever I do does not start my mac. I always reinstall mavericks. it works fine for 2 days even with gfxCardStatus. and the next thing i know is a black screen and no matter how many times i restart in safe mode, restore mode, single user mode. it does not work.

Pretty dissapointed

Those of you who are commenting here, I suggest before writing, read through at least the last 20 pages of the discussion, otherwise you might get confused.

Some people asking why they should give out their laptop info here, if you read through the thread, you notice some of the users are collecting information regarding the date, model, problem, etc.

There is a Google Document created as well as the ones @saramwrap (if I remember te name correctly) is collecting.

As @apple_power mentioned, this is a process which takes time for sure, and we all need to provide more details and inform others (friends, media, sites, blogs, social media, feedback, etc) regarding the issue untill our voice is heard by Apple.

Some of us like myself, talked with Apple Care/Genuis about the issue, over the phone I sent the article written in Appleinsider about this to the technician over the phone, he read it and talked about it with his senior while I was on the phone. So they surely know about the issue and it was all logged on my case including this thread.

Again I suggest read couple of pages (at least 15/20) before you post.

There is also a link (couple of pages back) which you can input your serial number and get the prodcution/details of your laptop to post it here.

rajdsouza wrote:

 

Whatever I do does not start my mac. I always reinstall mavericks. it works fine for 2 days even with gfxCardStatus. and the next thing i know is a black screen and no matter how many times i restart in safe mode, restore mode, single user mode. it does not work.

 

Pretty dissapointed

Hi,

I disabled the screen saver an don't let my system go to sleep.

To start your computer, try this:

Let it cool down for a while.

Remove the the power cord an start from battery…

Sometimes you have to try a few times (check the temperature above F3/F4 it should not be hot)

Enjoy your 

@rajdsouza:  

I have the same exact problem. For about a week after the blue/grey screen began appearing, I was able to safe boot and use gfxcard.

And the suddenly it stopped booting at all, just like you said. No safe boot, no single user mode, not even a flicker from the display. Same problem as you. I commiserate.

I'm going to take it in to my Apple store next week when I'm back in the States.

Btw, my MacBook frizted out when I was on location in a remote place in Cambodia. It nearly ruined the job there, cost me days and days of work and $$$$$.

I expected it to last longer than 14 months from the day of purchase. Too much to ask, I guess.

I stopped posting here when nearly every comment I made was deleted or edited for little reason. I guess comments about writing emails to Apple are inflammatory and should be censored, right?

@barang

I was 2 weeks in to my job when this happened. I bought a new MBP which i had to as i cannot go without working. When you take your mac to apple i am sure they will tell you you have to replace your logic board. There has to be some reason for the logic board to go wrong. No one has..

@apple_power

I will try that next time i reinstall my mac. hopefully i will be able to use it. I was supposed to get a iMac for home and use MBP while travelling now i have to use a MBP as i spent all my iMac money into buying a new MBP.

Apple discussion board is so fast to delete posts i wonder why they are not fast in responding to our hardware failure issue. It takes what a week to do some progress with the wporkforce apple has to identify what is the issue. I guess they are making thier strategy now to face this issue.

Apple, Please stop deleting posts. I defended your products so many times and right now you guys are dissapointing me. I am recording all posts you are deleting for future references. This is so not what I thought you guys were as a company. Try to reply to us by saying what you guys are doing about this issue and stop snooping in the forums lokking for posts to delete. Thanks and I really hope this is not deleted.

@namyap

Collecting details will not help. It should be a tsunami of documents and webpages all over the net about this issue and forum. I will also not provide my serialnumber to any website which is collecting info. Concentrate on the issue. What will you get by collecting a doc of affected macs. is someone head of apple customer service who will read that. Else it does not make sense.

<Edited By Host>

@game_mil

I know they are so fast in deleting posts i wonder whay they are not so fast in fixing it the right way.

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