Q: 2011 MacBook Pro and Discrete Graphics Card

I've done a full complete restore.. it works after about a week - but then does the exact same thing.

The last few days, my screen will be blank when i open the lid (coming from sleep mode)..

Frustrating and annonying indeed.

If you have this problem, please submit feedback here -

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

Hi all,

Apple Australia have offered to replace my Logic Board for free (out of warranty). They noted particularly that my MacBook was in pristine physical condition. I also argued that a $3000+ computer shouldn't fail within 36 months of purchase.

Hopefully they recgnise this as a manufacturing fault and all of you can get your money refunded.

Now to check this GPU and make sure it holds up (90 day warranty).

Good luck everyone!

Submitting feedback is only way:

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

This is good news.

I might have missed it, but is your MacBook and early 2011 one?

Like many people here I have been having similar issues. It started suddenly two weeks ago and the issue has been on and off since then. At first I thought it was the graphics card getting too hot but my Macbook Pro (Late 2011) would freeze even when the temps were ~58°C.

I then backed up everything and re-installed ML 10.8.2 and then upgraded to 10.8.4. For a while that seemed to work but then suddenly the other day it happened again, out of the blue, and when the temps were normal.

I am now trying to install ML 10.8.2 again after wiping the disk clean but I'm running into a repeatable issue where after a few minutes the screen goes black, the disc spins down, and the fans start to spin up (like it's having the problem).

I've run the AHT test (Internet Recovery) three times now on extended mode with no errors. I tried running DBAN earlier but it reported that it couldn't run and there was failure (possibly bad disk sectors, but I believe it just doesn't have the capability to fully detect the disk).

I've sent in feedback to Apple via the link shared on this thread and notified them of my issue as well as the existence of this thread. I will let everyone know if I hear back from them and what success (or failure) I may have in trying to recover my Macbook Pro.

hey guys my laptop's been working fine since i got the graphics chip replaced. this shop did the repair www.hottoyzph.com, took out the old chip and replaced it with a new one.

they initially gave me a 50% chance it will work so i took the chance before i opted for the apple option. it cost me around 5000 php (more or less 100 USD), they even replaced the thermal compound on the processor and cleaned up the internals.

Yep mine is a 15" Early 2011 MacBook Pro.

For those looking for a way to force the problem to appear, I have found that switching to discrete only with gfxcardstatus and then running the cinebench GPU benchmark program (http://www.maxon.net/?id=1258) is pretty much guaranteed to do it at least in my case.  My machine will rarely get more than a minute into the benchmarking before the video starts to glitch.  You do need to force quit the program to show them that the problem persists when you are back at just the finder and that it is not just the program screwing up the display.)

This is what I used to demonstrate the problem the other day when I brought my early 2011 15" MBP back to the Apple Store after the logic board swap done a week ago (fortunately under Applecare) proved to have fixed nothing. (If anything the new motherboard had the problem worse than the old one.)

I already posted this in the longer thread

(https://discussions.apple.com/message/22500408#22500408)

Are all dedicated graphic cards for the MBP 15"/17" early 2011 concerned?

choice for the 15" was

AMD Radeon HD 6750 M with 1 GB GDDR5 SDRAM

AMD Radeon HD 6490 M with 256 MB GDDR5 SDRAM

for the 17"

AMD Radeon HD 6770 M with 1 GB GDDR5 SDRAM

My 15" MBP has the HD 6750 M and I do not know if the problem also occures (that often) with the HD 6490 M.

Changing the board would still be economic, but I am wondering if it would be better to take one with the smaller graphic card if it is not fraught with problems. Is that possible? I am really worrying about making a repair and having the same problems again after a few month when the warranty for the repair is over...

What do you think? It might also be a lower price!? It's not the best deal since it has lower power, but I need a working machine.

Hi,

Yesterday I had phone call from Apple. I described our problems, and today i will have next call with technical support. I'll try do something with that. Response was from feedback MBP and i have response e-mail from Tim Cook address. I hope it's seriously Apple care.

Bests!

A curious thing I just discovered that might be related: My (three times resoldered) macbook is holding up well so far. I just used the backlit keyboard for the first time in a while, and the area around the number 3 is darkened. Is that something some of you are experiencing as well?

On a sidenote, how many of you who are experiencing issues have these things:

• OWC Data doubler with removed optical disk and replaced with an HDD
• Samsung SSD inserted into the primary slot
• SSD inserted into the data doubler
• Stock HDD inserted into the data doubler
• Speaker issues where notifications sound distorted (once you play music though, it fixes the issue)

It might be nothing, but maybe it's related to some of these?

I have got the same problem since one week. I own a MBP 17 i7 2,2Ghz Quad Early 2011.

It has been started wit the behavior described in the thread here.

Then it ends up that the Mac always starts into a blue sreen or the white screen. Even when I start from an Mountain Lion USB stick. Also the fans start spinning.

I tried the following:

cd ~/DisabledExtensions

sudo mv ATIRadeonX2000.kext /System/Library/Extensions

sudo touch /System/Library/Extensions

That works for me. I can start and work with the integrated graphic card. Sometimes after a shutdown you need to run the NVRAM reset before it starts successfully.

Now its for sure, the ATI GPU is broken.

Apples says this is an unknown problem and they dont want to help me!

I live in Düssledorf, I will have to go to the Apple Store in Cologne then. As member hnrk mentioned

"I've been to an Apple Store here in Cologne, Germany today, they only offered a repair for 410 Euro + 19% VAT = 487,90 Euro "

I hope that is still the current price for an logicboard replacement.

Don't do enything yet.

I'm in touch with Apple support and we are making diagnoses. I'm hope Apple do something with that problem.

Please do one thing. Press power button and after that option+cmd+v and take a picture last logged line.

My screen is:

Oh my previous post was not correct:

Must be this way:

create folder /System/Library/ExtensionsDisabled

sudo mv /System/Library/Extensions/ATIRadeonX2000.kext /System/Library/ExtensionsDisabled

Not workinkg for me..