Q: 2011 MacBook Pro and Discrete Graphics Card

exactly...we need to get rid of the bga, there must be something in the system that must go away so that it will look as you said to a 13"mbp at least it will work smooth.by the way another thing that realy bothers me are the responses i get to geniuses, applecenters etc...They don't even know what's in the computer...they just keep saying that the logic board is one big piece and if a part of it fails then they replace it all. Also they keep saying that mine is isolated case, but then why the first time i replaced it they made me wait 25 days more than the 5 working days scheduled due to the big demand of boards of the same model (this is what the guy at apple told me for the delay)? I would like to know something from an apple ingeneer that will say here is the problem due to...and then solution is this or that or no solution buy a new one or take this system update for your model at least it doesn't try to use the affected chip. all ideas i am just bored to spend my time over a "once at the top" of laptops computers bought to work with and not just to use it like an ipad or so. If i wanted a fashion computer i'd rather buy an expensive macbook air.

let's find something.

wish you all the best

There must be a way for us to make this issue public and reported by the mainstream media. Only then, when Apple's public reputation and perception by stockholders is affected negatively will they foot the bill and do the right thing. This is a clear hardware malfunction. I've ran the Apple hardware scans and they say nothing is wrong with the machine. Great tool there Apple! The problem is that it will be an expensive repair. Very expensive! Logic board replacements are only a temporarily mask. We need new logic boards with a different chip. Possibly having to give us all 2012 models or something. It'll cost millions, which we all know Apple has, but they're greedy. They've recalled 2011 iMacs for a GPU failure and it pretty much uses the same chip. Difference there is they can probably just swap out the GPU for a new one. The GPUs in the MacBook Pros are part of the logic board and not easily replaced. We can only hope and pray that a solution comes soon. Keep making noise people...

Hope I'm wrong but wait till the new even smaller models are getting 2-3 years old.
Agree, Apple makes nicely designed, small, usable stuff.
At least, visually nice looking.

But one thing I learned about electronics is that the hotter things get, the more chance they will fail.
Most fails due the "joule effect"
And it's that one of the most problematic things when making electronic consumer goods smaller is.... yes... HEAT!!!

The hotter it gets, the more chance it will fail.
Beeing it a component destroyed by the joule effect.
Or mechanical problems like solder connections due the expansion and contraction.
Both are heat related....
Of course, some components have lesser problems or generate less heat.

The macbook air only has integrated Intel HD Graphics 5000 which has lesser problems compared to ATI/AMD or nVidia.
The downside of course beeing much lower performance...
Which is probably not what they are made for.

Imo, one doing graphics, video or other heavy load application should never go for a laptop.
Be it an Apple or standard PC, laptops are made for PORTABILITY, not for beeing used as work horses or gaming.
A desktop will allways perform much better with lesser chance of failing on this.
Add to that easy expandabilty, much better cooling...

Would be nice beeing able to get Apple computers as expandible and configurable as pcs...
Sure I would build them for customers and be happy with it knowing it would hardly fail and be easy to repair should it be needed.

I have followed this thread with great interest because I own and use an early 2011 15" MBP with the problematic GPU (my computer is out of warranty). Although I am totally dependent on my laptop, and I use it for several hours a day for both business and entertainment, I do not generally perform heavy processing tasks, or use an external monitor, and it may be that I never will develop the problems described here. However, rather than sitting around waiting and wondering if my screen will turn blue, I would prefer to take appropriate precautionary action now, if I knew what that was.

Does anyone following this blog who has a sense of the technical/mechanical/thermal aspects of the heat damage issue have a suggestion regarding what I could do to lessen my future risk? Would having my laptop openned up and examined, and possibly treated, help ? Now that I know about the potential problem I would hate one day to look back and realize that if only I had done something sooner I might not have lost my whole logicboard, for example. I thank you in advance for any advice.

(I want to mention that I bought my MBP as a reconditioned item from Apple. I specifically purchased an early 2011 model because it was the last computer built for Snow Leopard. For reasons not relevent here, I would not want a new computer...that would not good news for me.)

My takes to effectively bypass the possibility of having the issue is need to use the higher power processor. Now that can be achieved by

- hacking the os to do so like some of the guys out there.

- or apple releases a patch to disable the external GPU.

I would think that the second method would be more effective and also more probably work as its being used in the 13" MBP.

We will lose some performance but not the entire notebook when it fails and it will fail.

JayW2181 wrote:

 

- or apple releases a patch to disable the external GPU.

 

We will lose some performance but not the entire notebook when it fails and it will fail.

Would let you still payed for something not working.

It is fixable, so Apple should fix the issue imo.

Nothing more, nothing less.

Not work around it.

Fair would be for them to aknowledge the problem.

Maybe make work around like you said untill they fix the real problem.

Mine early 2011 15'' MBP also broke, the amd 6750 is now completely in unusable state, and I needed to remove AMD drivers to even boot to OSX. Of course the system now lacks 3D acceleration completely, as it still thinks that the AMD is in use, but in fact, software renderer is use, resulting in laggy system. I haven't find way how to get rid of AMD drivers in fasion that Intel GPU drivers will kick in correctly. gfxcardstatus can't be used to force intel drivers anymore, as the system thinks that external monitor is connected.

The MBP is 7 months out of warranty, and in my country there is no apple store, just apple authorized resellers and service. They told me that the repair would cost 700-800 euros, which is insane. I contacted other apple authorized service centers, but I have to yet hear from them, but I think the repair cost will be the same.

Anyway, if Apple will not recall this MBP series for replacement, I am done with apple. When I buy notebook for 2300 eur, I expect it will work for at least 5 years (except hdd and battery).

Has anyone experienced a temporary improvement (or fix) in any or all of the described symptoms by carefully reseating or changing their system's RAM? 

Unfortunately it is not related to RAM, it is because of defective GPU chip...

Of couse, in some cases, memory defects can cause similar issues(but as I know, not with our video - because it has own RAM, and is not depended on system RAM)... But before you will try do something with memory - run memory test (for example from Apple Hardware Test), and only if it fails - do something with your RAM.

I was not asking for any advice or for anyone to define the cause of the problem.  I was simply asking if anyone had experienced a temperary improvement after reseating or changing their system's RAM. 

My system was having many of the graphics issues discribe here and these seemed to be getting worse.  I last two day's I've been unable to boot successfully.  After two days my system gave me the 3 beeps indicating RAM error.  So I openned it up examined the RAM, removed and reseated the RAM, and system started working every boot. 

If I understand properly the system RAM is used by the integrated GPU.  Graphics switching might be affected by RAM, no?  (I've read at least one post in this forum that indicates the author believes the problem is not which GPU but the switching from one to the other.)

Since reseating the RAM I've been able (a) reboot successfully on every attempt (b) to successfully use the applications that require High Performance graphics and switch back to Integrated, without any failure, which has been unusual the last week.  Switching the last two weeks has resulted in hang and restarting results in the blue or grey vertical lines.  But not at the moment after reseating RAM. 

I did notice that the plastic arms that hold the RAM in place are not very strong and that one corner of the "top" memory module seemed to resist being inserted. 

Without getting someone pontificating of what they think the problem is, let me ask my question again. 

Has anyone experienced a temporary improvement (or fix) in any or all of the described symptoms by carefully reseating or changing their system's RAM?

Has anyone experienced a temporary improvement (or fix) in any or all of the described symptoms by carefully reseating or changing their system's RAM?

Reseating the RAM is the first thing I do when systems start to run unstable. So, yes I tried that and even swapped it for different RAM (only 1 DIMM in each of the two sockets) but it did obviously not change a thing because the problem is not RAM releated at all. If it only were that simple...

degger, please read the question carefully. 

When I started having these problems a few months ago, after all of my software changes failed to fix it, I swap out all of my hardware upgrades and put back Apple stock configuration. My system worked great for about a week and a half but then it started back again worse than before. In the end I had my logic board replaced, and it's been working perfectly for the past two months. I have read reports from others who had similar things happen - it fixes itself but then breaks all over again. What a mysterious problem!

I took my broken early 2011  mbp to a 3rd Authorized Service, and the technician told me that a new logicboard replacement will cost about 80% of a new macbookpro, but he opened a case so someone at Apple could bring a solution. He asked me a handwritten letter (with the best manners I could write), screenshots, and some photos of my laptop so they see my computer was in perfect physical condition.

Well... I just get an answer from technician (a really kind guy), telling me that he's sorry but Apple rejected my solicitude, no other word, no explanations.

I've read some people get a free replacement, and I thought it was because Apple knows about this issue, and probably they do... But maybe those guys getting free repairs were just the chosen ones.

It's absolutely clear this is a manufacturing issue, because of its design or poor paste, or whatever it is, but it's not about we the users.

Here in Chile, there's no apple stores, there's no geniuses, there's only authorized resellers, so probably they're not really interested in repair my computer as much as they are in selling me a new one.

Anyways, when I bought a macbook pro, I made my investment to get a laptop largely better than what I got.

nudoru, 

I don't want to just assume that  "all of my(your) hardware upgrades"  included memory modules (the old making an assumption rule might apply).  So what did your list of hardware upgrades include? 

I've replaced hard drive and memory as previous failures seemed to indicate these has having faiiled.  This seemed to have temporarily improved on the problem, but then after a period of time the problems do seem to reappear.  I too put the original hard dive and memory modules back in the system and this also resulted in a temporary week or two of no problems.  Mysterious indeed... I've seen just about every symptom described in this post.