Q: 2011 MacBook Pro and Discrete Graphics Card

Lead Free soldering has ben being developed since RoHS was mandatory, the formulaes ad manufacturing techniques have been varing since, however sometimes a product push this soldering to new limits (as our MBP) and is hard to predict premature failures like this.

The most important fact, is that our laptos still young (mine has less than 2.5 Year and still at 90% Batery Health), but its mainboard are dying preamturely for the mean of such device range (much less than half expectation for an Apple notebook), So Apple must take cards on the matter given that their brad have the risk to be perceived as the new *DELL* I Owned an Dell prior to move to Apple Realm, they used to be god until they dismissed to replace chagers, boards of prematurely death laptops, plus complicating things with excesive propetary hardware (two signs now showed by Apple).

I'm Happy on Apple most due OS/X and I'm considering to return to the iPhone as the iPhone 6 is launched (I love the new improvemenets on iOS 8 at least Apple adressed the reasosn why i axed iThings), but I'll consider another brand an Linux If I dont feel the commitement our devices deserve from they builder.

ps3specialist wrote:

 

You went to the wrong line , here is what you need to keep in mind from the same article " “Lead free solder doesn’t wet well so you can get better lead spacing,” Lasky said. He cited a study by Motorola where designers built identical boards with lead-based and lead-free solder. It showed that leads printed close together shorted out when lead solder flowed during melting. That makes leadfree is almost a must for Apple's little logic boards.

Still got nothing to do with ductility of the solder, or why they are failing! (If it is fatigue failure) Just that during soldering at greater degree's of miniturisation, lead free may be better due to it's wetting properites.

So if you can solder the GPU with leaded solder on the MBP and it works, there is absolutly no relevence to your point about the wetting properites of lead free solder.

Please show me an article that talks about the fatigue properites of lead free solder that supports your argument.

I don't mind that you support the use of leaded solder, for me and after thousands of reballing of many different products I decided not to use leaded solder, I still can use it by request but I don't give warranty in that case simply because I don't expect it to last for too long.

ps3specialist wrote:

 

I don't mind that you support the use of leaded solder, for me and after thousands of reballing of many different products I decided not to use leaded solder, I still can use it by request but I don't give warranty in that case simply because I don't expect it to last for too long.

No, no is question to support or not, what we dont support is Apple lack of commitement, as you surely know RoHS solder and process evolves every year, new formulas and soldering ovens are released just to address issues like this.

I Really Like Apple to repair our laptops with LEAD FREE SOLDER, BUT A FORMULATION THAT WILL NOT BROKE OVER THE TIME.

Another thing here not so much discussed are the excess of thermal paste, when these paste conduct the heat to the chip board is overheating the soldering much more than if poper applied to only the rigth quatity and rigth places.

Hi All,

Like many of you I rely heavily on my MBP for almost ALL of my work, editing, mixing, audio & video.

I have just had my GPU fail and after being quoted £500 for an Apple Logic Board replacement, I have decided to bite the bullet and simply buy another machine (fortunately mine is being picked up by a friend vising USA).

Now, since I have this nice looking paperweight, I have also decided it may be a handy backup machine to have hanging about. I've just sent it off to B G A _ Repairs (without the spaces) a company I found on eBay who will reball & replace the GPU.

Does anyone here have experience with this company, any results or satisfied customers that can give me some info on how long this may work for? I figure £160 for a backup machine that I would ONLY use a few times a month is better than a £1500 paperweight right?

Thanks in advance for your thoughts and comments!

seems like iMac is getting free replacement: http://9to5mac.com/2013/08/16/apple-opens-graphics-card-replacement-program-for- some-mid-2011-imacs/

Hi FreefallStudios,

There is no reason why your machine shouldn't be back to peap performace after a reball.

Along with the reball they should clean out all the dust and put new thermal paste on the heatsinks. So should be as good as new!

As you are quoting UK pounds as the price, I assume you are in the UK, and are using the service I've also seen on ebay UK (who uses leaded solder). So while only time will tell, I'd suggest that you should get many years service from it, as it no longer has the lead free solder issues it was built with! LOL (i.e. No solder fatigue failure, or tin whisker growth).

When you get it back I'd recommend you hammer the **** out of it so see it you can make it fail (not that it should) while you still have a warranty from the reball.

let us know how it goes!

tianjinjames wrote:

 

seems like iMac is getting free replacement: http://9to5mac.com/2013/08/16/apple-opens-graphics-card-replacement-program-for- some-mid-2011-imacs/

This is almost 12 months ago!

Hi Mate,

Thanks for the swift reply, the company installing the new GPU and Reballing will be using lead based solder so hopefully that helps in the long run. I am in the UK and so prices are in GBP - seems a fair rate?

I am DEFINITELY going to stress test it with PT open (multiple plugin windows) perhaps Final Cut and maybe 3-5 YouTube videos all playing back simutlaneously to see if I can make it fail. If it holds up then I am going to use it primarily as my backup - Accounting Software, Emails, you know, give it the easy life

Just looking to see if anyone had used that specific company and could report on if they are happy, how long thier machine has worked incident free for etc.

Anyone got anything to report on the home front?

Hi again FreefallStudio's,

You say your friend is picking you up a new machine while visiting the USA.

Are you aware that the kepboard may be different from the UK version? - I say that as my 2011 MBP is an American version and different from the UK version. (Not sure if this is still the case with new ones...)

Thre plug will also be different, but i'm sure you realise that.

Hi mate,

That's actually not a problem at all as I'm actually from Australia (as is my dead MBP) so I've never had a UK keyboard layout and if I'm honest I wouldn't want one haha!

I have a few spare adapters lying around so it should be okay.

It works out £686 cheaper to buy in America than UK!

Thanks again!

Hey everyone

Here are some photos and a video of my now deceased macbook pro, before it completely died.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UGgKmH-CBGI

This is getting so sad

JoseAngelAcosta wrote:

 

This is getting so sad

What is even sadder is that I have a 7 year old Dell lapcrap as a backup, that works just fine!

Commiserations Pier11, my sympaties...

Has anyone managed to get a fix through an insurance? Surely some insurance policies should cover such damage.