Q: 2011 MacBook Pro and Discrete Graphics Card

Hey, hope the information below is beneficial to other people:

The GPU in my early 2011 Macbook Pro died last week (the screen just died suddenly and there was black and white horizontal lines across the entire screen. from that point onwards it didn't turn on properly and never made it to the login screen).

The faulty GPU was indeed the AMD 6750M. (i was able to get it running at one point but as soon as graphics card switching kicked in, the screen just died)

I booked a Genius Bar appointment and took it to an Apple store. I was told that the issue is covered under a repair programme and that I wouldn't have to pay anything to get it fixed. They fixed it within the same day and I went in to pick it up the day after. No dramas. They replaced the logic board and faulty graphics card.

This was in Sydney, Australia.

Let's hope this repair programme is active in other cities/countries as well. Anyone affected by the issue should differently bring it up if they are asked to pay anything.

zalix,

That's terrific... I would bet, though, that they got the mid-2010 replacement scheme confused with your 2011 model. That's what first happened to me when I took my machine in.

Maybe I'm wrong - maybe there's a 2011 scheme in place now: but I wouldn't bet on it.

Clinton

Hi zalix,

If don't disturb you, could you extend the information about your issue. Maybe with the id number of your problem or repair number all of us can order to Apple they apply the same  repair programme. Right now in Europe there is no news about a free repair programme. Tomorrow I've got to talk with the headquarter of Apple in Europe and I would like to add all information as possible.

Best regards

Daniel

Hey no problem at all.

The repair number number is R118089054.

Some product info:

• Warranty status: Out of Warranty (OW)
• Model: Macbook Pro (15-inch, Early 2011)
• Model Identifier: MacBookPro8,2
  

There was also a short description written by the genius bar employee. Here's the part about the repair programme:

"Verified visually at bar, checked notes and saw fall under rep program"

Hope that helps you Daniel. Good luck tomorrow.

Thank so much indeed Zalix. I hope it works tomorrow. Anyway, Apple should to guarantee that the problem will not come back in the future. Other way it's impossible to trust in the laptop if I have any important project to work with.

I'm filmmaker and editor so I'm afraid with the future

Cheers

Daniel

As I previously posted here, I had the same symptoms with my early 2011 Macbook Pro (screen freezes, non-booting, screen split in 2 by vertical black bar, blue lines... etc.)

The response from the Genius Bar was that I needed a new SSD. That seemed strange since their diagnosis conflicts with that of this forum regarding these symptoms. Anyway, after an intial £750 quote to replace the SSD, I phoned them to speak to the engineer fixing my mac and ask if there was a cheaper option, eg. a regular hard drive instead of SSD. Two calls later and half an hour on hold, the engineer told me that I could have the repair done for free, based on the age of the laptop. I was happy to go along with this and see what came of it.

I collected my mac yesterday.

Today the problem returned, after a couple of hours use. Same old story: The screen froze, I had to hard-reset the machine holding down the power button. It took another 7 or 8 reboots before it successfully booted up.

Most of the time, booting up the machine quickly gets stuck on a grey screen after the apple logo disappears. The fans soon kick in. I find that then it's best to let the fans run for a while/let the machine get hotter for say 10 mins. The next attempt(s) at booting tends to work.

Anyway back to square 1 and another Genius Bar appointment...

Just a note (which will probably get lost in the deafening roar that this thread now is) to say that the solution henser87 gave a few pages ago doesn't do quite what he said and is a bit too sledgehammery.

Moving/disabling all the ATI/AMD kexts as he described did not--in my case at least--force the system to use the on-chip Intel integrated graphics--rather it seemed to make my system use the Radeon 6750M card in a super-basic mode, like software-framebuffer style or something. Redraws were flickery and the system was barely usable. System Information.app showed the 6750M still active, and the Monitors seciton in System Preferences acted like my built-in display was an external monitor (plus gfxCardStatus, which I already had installed, reported the the discrete graphics were in use, and said I couldn't switch to integrated because "external monitor" was using the discrete card).

So, looking further back in this thread, user saramwrap said back on page 126 of this thread ( !?! ) to try disabling just ATIRadeonX3000.kext (or ATIRadeonX2000.kext, as your hardware case may be). This didn't quite work for me either--system still wouldn't boot. I'm guessing this was because I'm on Mavericks and that solution was back in Mountain Lion days. Anyway, I tried disabling more one by one, and seem to have gotten lucky on the first try. I have now disabled:

ATIRadeonX2000.kext

ATIRadeonX2000GLDriver.bundle

And voila! My system boots again, where it was going straight to a grey screen every boot previously. Scarily, while when I booted gfxCardStatus showed me on the integrated chip (yay!) when I launched Aperture, it said it had switched to the ATI card (yikes!), whereupon I promptly quit Aperture, switched gfxCardStatus to use integrated only, and now when I start Aperture it doesn't switch. So, for now, I think I'm back up and running with only integrated graphics...which thankfully I can live with for now, maybe until the Broadwell RMBPs come out. Till then I'll sit back and see if at this point in the wave of users having this problem if it finally triggers a response from Apple.

Oh yeah, add me to the list, yesterday my Late 2013 MBP i7-quad w/Radeon 6750M suddenly went all black-and-white lines on the screen, and then wouldn't boot again (grey screen) till I started messing with .kexts.

My output for `kextstat | grep AMD` now shows:

   86    2 0xffffff7f810c9000 0x109000   0x109000   com.apple.kext.AMDSupport (1.2.0) <85 83 11 10 7 5 4 3 1>

   87    0 0xffffff7f811d2000 0x212000   0x212000   com.apple.kext.AMD6000Controller (1.2.0) <86 83 11 10 5 4 3 1>

  110    0 0xffffff7f81553000 0x3c3000   0x3c3000   com.apple.AMDRadeonX3000 (1.2.0) <109 83 11 7 5 4 3 1>

  123    0 0xffffff7f81b9c000 0x24000    0x24000    com.apple.kext.AMDFramebuffer (1.2.0) <86 83 11 10 7 5 4 3 1>

So it has been about a week since i had my 15" macbook pro with defect gpu reballed. Not 100% sure if the people (not Apple) actually reballed the gpu or if they just applied more thermal paste. Anyways, it is working for now, today however i noticed that when opening InDesign (or any app that would call upon the 6750 gpu) the screen tints slightly blue which to my knowledge, is NOT normal. And if I recall, this happened the last time as well, a couple of days before my macbook became unusable and only getting as far as a static grey or blue striped screen.

Basically, i feel that very soon, i'll again be sitting with the same issue. Already paid alot of money for the "reball" and do have guarantee on it, but things aren't lookin too great.

Anybody on here that has had issues after they reballed they're Macbooks?

Well my MBP won't boot anymore. What was the number that everyone called? I'm not under warranty anymore and apple's requesting a $19 charge for that.

Any information would be good, phone number, emails, twitter handles. Thanks. Best of luck to the everyone else. I'll update if I get any feedback.

Where did you get it done. Any reputable place should have given you a warranty period. I wouldn't trust them if they didn't.

I have an early 2011 MBP that recently suffered the dreaded death of the discrete graphics chip. Horizontal, vertical lines on screen etc followed by white/grey screen of doom. I was somehow able to install GFX software http://gfxcardstatus.en.softonic.com/mac

during a rare boot up so that it would run only on the integral graphics chip. Life saver! Finished audio project.

I think GFX reset itself to "dynamic switching" setting which meant I could not access my Mac without using a friends imac but could not access GFX from target mode so my Mac was pretty useless.

I have no Apple care so after a lot of online research realised it was this problem with the lead-free solder on the discrete graphics chip breaking down due to the heating and cooling of the laptop.

I was quoted £700 by a local mac solutions guy who is well regarded and considered good value by some clever folk that I know that rely on Apple machines throughout their lighting design business. £700 ***!

After a little more research I came across reballing which is effectively removing the discrete chip and all the old solder. New balls of Leaded (better) solder are then added to the logicboard and the chip reattached.

I found a couple of small businesses on ebay (uk) that provided this service and had great feedback. The soldering work Including postage in both directions and a stress test of the logic board cost me £80 and just a few days.

All comms were excellent and my Macbook pro was returned working, tested and without the dodgy solder that I would have got again after spending £700 on a new logic board.

This is the guy I used and I cannot recommend him and his service enough:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=141108914624&ssPageName=ADM E:X:RTQ:GB:1123

I hope this helps someone as it was definitely the way to go. Apple certainly weren't interested.

SaMiChi wrote:

 

Where did you get it done. Any reputable place should have given you a warranty period. I wouldn't trust them if they didn't.

I got it done an hours drive away here in Cape Town where I am based. I do believe the company is reputable, and I do have 3 months guarantee, yet after my first "repair" the problem seems to reoccur - will confirm once my macbook is unbootable, so far some of the symptoms are popping up again. Not 100% sure they actually reballed it. Although i payed for a reball, the techie said he put on new thermal paste after cleaning the macbook - which I could have probably done myself.

It's only been a week so far but it comes with a three month guarantee (good point though). Lots of very positive feedback from the guys ebay page which is why I chose him. This is the service offered. (Not something I'd want to undertake myself):

"For the buy-it-now price, you will receive a repair to your motherboard that includes removal of the existing GPU, re-balling using leaded solder spheres (which are much less prone to fracture again at high temperature).  The price also includes removal of the board from your laptop and replacement after the repair has been carried out, internal cleaning plus testing.  I will also overhaul and refurbish your fan assembly and replace the cooling compound to help keep the temperature down in the future!"

Nothing's 100 percent but it's obviously a weak spot that needs a solid repair. You get lots of genuine customer feedback from an eBay page which is why I took that route rather than local. I'll post again if I have any issues.

Thanks for the info.  I have been playing with the extensions over the last couple of days and following the post by Matt Williamson I have filtered my critical extensions down to:

• AMD6000Controller.kext
• AMDRadeonX3000.kext

If both of these are removed, I can boot but with all of the issues I mentioned previously (although the brightness appears to have fixed itself).  Laptop itself still running in some degraded graphics mode and thinks it is running on an external display.  If either of these files is returned to /S/L/E then I fail to boot.  Interestingly adding one file at a time I get a different response.  Adding only AMD6000Controller.kext the boot appears to hang at the grey screen with apple logo and does not proceed.  Adding only the AMDRadeonX3000.kext I get blue screen with thin vertical grey lines.  utcome appears different to Matt, maybe as my card is the 6490M using the X3000 extensions.  Once booted and running kextstat | grep AMD (and ATI) I only have AMDSupport.kext loaded.

Anyone have any further ideas to troubleshoot this?

My MacBook Pro (15-inch Late 2011) was broken 2 days ago.

Boot in Recovery mode:

The authorized service provider in Thailand called me today.

They told me that I need to change the logic board which cost about 30,000 THB ($924)

I am worried that after logic board replacement, I will run into the same issue, and need to change the logic board again. Any one got better idea or suggestions?