Q: 2011 MacBook Pro and Discrete Graphics Card

odedias wrote:

 

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

Sadly there is no logic in that avenue, as a fix by Apple is just another dodgy Logic Board. And if you did claim on your insurance (say house insurance) there is normally an excess, plus the hike in premiums for the years to follow. So not worth the hassle when a reball is say £120 (£170 with new GPU chip) - UK prices.

Lessons learned for my next Mac:

1- Get Extended Apple Care for as long as possible.

2- Sell 6 month Before Apple Care Expires.

3- Visit Apple Support forumns more often, just to watch how is doing my mac model on colective failures,

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JoseAngelAcosta wrote:

 

Lessons learned for my next Mac:

 

1- Get Extended Apple Care for as long as possible.

 

2- Sell 6 month Before Apple Care Expires.

 

3- Visit Apple Support forumns more often, just to watch how is doing my mac model on colective failures,

Yeah but when you buy your next Mac, they will have installed a self destruct in it to go off one day after Apple care expires, so as long as you ensure you follow step 2 you should be fine!

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JoseAngelAcosta wrote:

 

Lessons learned for my next Mac:

 

1- Get Extended Apple Care for as long as possible.

 

2- Sell 6 month Before Apple Care Expires.

 

3- Visit Apple Support forumns more often, just to watch how is doing my mac model on colective failures,

Or simply do not buy a next mac...

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Hello.

just joining the flow of failed GPU's in 2011 macbook pros here.

for anyone it interests -

i have a Late 2011, 15" MacBook Pro, base model. (6750m dGPU) and 2.2 Ghz Core i5 Processor.

i'm based in the uk, London.

i purchased my MacBook Pro on Marh 12th 2012.

it just died last sunday, but i do believe i was experiencing early warning signs of its incoming failure (sudden system freezes/crashes. including to black screen. force restarts)

but sunday it simply went to a blue screen with vertical dark lines. since then i managed to boot up once more, and i wrote it off as just another crash.. and stupidly i decided to continue working as i always did - Intensive CPU work  - like video editing /encoding.

and then konk, it died. and has not been able to boot up since, it stays at the white/grey screen with the apple logo gone. sometimes it will eventually turn blue with dark vertical lines.

it also gets very hot and the fans kick in very loudly as if i was doing CPU intensive work..

i'm going to call apple care very soon, but before i do, i must return the original 500gb HDD to the laptop - which i happened to be using as an external drive - so it has data on it i must extract first. as soon as i've done that i will be taking this to the apple store / calling apple care.

updates to come soon.

This came from the 9to5mac.com link to iMac27 replacement program....

Apple will replace the AMD card free of charge up to three years from the computer’s purchase date.

Saddly if Apple issues a recal, majority of the 2011 MBP's would not even be eligable for this. 

****Side Note****

I was hung up on twice this morning regarding the logic board issue from AppleCare.  I was explaining why my MBP was having issues....then I was transfered...to a blank dial tone. Second time I was transfered, the guy picked up listened to my explination..even responded, then I hear him say "Hello?" "Hello?"...Click.  Maybe I'm having problems with my iPhone?? HAHAHA!

What is even sadder is that when the GPU of the 2007 Macbook Pro failed, Appled issued a recall that lasted until the end of 2012, or 5 years after purchase date.

http://support.apple.com/kb/ts2377

It says a lot of what this company has become...

My first macbook pro suffered from this, and when I got the repair for free my faith in Apple was renewed. But now... I don't think I'll buy another Apple computer again.

Pier11 wrote:

 

What is even sadder is that when the GPU of the 2007 Macbook Pro failed, Appled issued a recall that lasted until the end of 2012, or 5 years after purchase date.

 

http://support.apple.com/kb/ts2377

 

It says a lot of what this company has become...

 

My first macbook pro suffered from this, and when I got the repair for free my faith in Apple was renewed. But now... I don't think I'll buy another Apple computer again.

I think that is everyone's sentiment, we don't mind that it failed as these things happen. It's Apple's denial/silence on the issue that is upsetting (Or my issue anyway!)

I won't buy another....

Today, I attempted to boot the MBP (it had been in shut down since last night) and for the first time since I discovered the SMC reset temporary workaround, it would not work. Grey boot screen (with the same horizontal striations as per usual) then apple logo (horizontal striations bleed over the apple logo) then grey screen and nothing. No keyboard backlight, no response from caps lock key or contrast or anything. Fans start purring at about the interval they would had I been able to log in and boot the OS. But still only grey screen.

So I shut down and attempt the SMC reset. For those who have never reset the System Management Controller, it is not difficult. After shutting down (if you are not able to log off and shut down, ie the os is in an absolute freeze state, holding down the power button for 10 seconds will do the trick) you must make sure that the Mag safe power connector is attached (and lit) and then press (Left-side)SHIFT-OPTION-COMMAND and the Power Button simultaneously and release simultaneously. The led indicator on the mag safe power connector will (in my experience) flicker from green to amber and back to green, when an SMC reset is successfully completed. I have also noticed a very subtle 'pop' noise, perhaps from the speakers?

Anywho, I have had to perform this function about 4 times since the problem first presented itself this weekend. Today, this time, the SMC reset does not work… Basically, attempting the SHIFT-OPTION-COMMAND+I/O Button does not incur the 'pop' nor cause the LED to flicker, and thus I am unsuccessful attempting to boot afterwards. I try my steps a second time and still nothing.

It occurs to me that I am waiting to witness the led "change state" (flicker from green to amber) and that it is usually amber when I am attempting this (this is because I am often using the MBP while it is not plugged into AC power, and so I have to plug-in in order to initiate the SMC reset.) Because the MBP has been plugged in all evening, it has a full charge and the LED is green, therefore I cannot witness it "change state" to green. This is just a passing thought because it would be very silly if a SMC reset could only be initiated when the battery is partially depleted. Nonetheless, I unplug the MBP and this time after shutting down. I attempt a NVRAM/PRAM reset (which is successful) and then a SMC reset. Voila, I have a working MBP again.

Now, I appreciate your response Hal Freidman, and I am realistic and understand that over 400 pages worth of fellow mac users (some of which are no doubt far more hardware savvy than myself) have attempted to wrap their heads around this problem. But the whole scenario and all of the evidence collected here just buggers belief. I understand that many of you have gone over this every which way and that many of you are convinced that there is a physical explanation for this epidemic (eg the lead-free vs leaded solder balling on 2011 MBP GPUs) and that definitely stands to reason. But to me, my personal experience so far defies this explanation. How can resetting the System Management Controller fix this problem (even if it is merely only a temporary fix?) Unless someone can describe to me how my understanding of physics here is flawed, I have a hard time accepting how resetting something within a computing system on a software level could affect something as macroscopically physical as the soldered connections of the GPU. Unless of course, resetting the SMC is forcing the MBP into using the integrated graphics chip rather than the discrete… That is possible, I suppose. I admit I do not know enough yet about the nuances of the system at play, but accounts such as DIESEL-X's "BOOT DISK Partition/Selection Screen" displaying properly only further fuel my curiosity and belief that something more complex is at work here.

Lastly--and I apologize for this TL/DR manifesto--I have had a very similar thing occur with this very Late-2011 MBP 15 (8,2) before… a malfunction that seems in every way hardware related that is 'magically' fixed by changing something in firmware (or software, rather, in this case.) For anyone interested in reading that account it can be found here (https://discussions.apple.com/message/24964949#24964949) or by googling "black magic MBP 2011."

Hi 'zkramer', I have to confess that I have reset both the SMC and NVRAM (PRAM on older non-Intel machines) many times now without any success on the issue being experienced here. This in turn lead me to believe that there is another non-volatile memory state that exists in the MacBook Pro that I would very much like to factory 'reset' should this exist, because it is possible for any state of non-volatile flash memory to become corrupt in some instances and/or as a result from something else.

As I've mentioned once before; I was further intrigued that despite wiping clean, formatting and re-installing the OS on the internal disk from scratch, plus resetting the SMC, plus resetting the NVRAM... that despite these measure my system still retained memory of the paired state of my external Apple Bluetooth keyboard and that it did not re-issue a request to pair or re-pair the Bluetooth keyboard again with the long generated on-screen code that it did a long time ago. Therefore maybe some parameters, settings and condition states are possibly being stored somewhere? and could they have any direct or indirect relationship with the GPU, maybe for a pre-loading instruction for kext files to the kernel in a certain sequence that may have become corrupt?

Or could things have possibly gone wrong on one occasion with the EFI partition when used to flash a firmware update over time? Again just wild guessing.

No doubt the issue really is that of the largely debated discreet GPU/logic board design and it's soldering techniques used, materials used, disciplines and overall configuration and quality of design. The latter making sense in light of the fact that my MacBook Pro will often crash soon after I run some graphical stress tests that bring on-line the discreet GPU.

However I'm just wild guessing and theorizing on the former.

In any case it's really Apple's call now for a initiating a full on replacement program.

Evil8Beezle wrote:

 

I think that is everyone's sentiment, we don't mind that it failed as these things happen. It's Apple's denial/silence on the issue that is upsetting (Or my issue anyway!)

 

I won't buy another....

Exactly!

Pier11 wrote:

 

JoseAngelAcosta wrote:

 

Lessons learned for my next Mac:

 

1- Get Extended Apple Care for as long as possible.

 

2- Sell 6 month Before Apple Care Expires.

 

3- Visit Apple Support forumns more often, just to watch how is doing my mac model on colective failures,

 

Or simply do not buy a next mac...

Sadly Lenovo dont put OS/X on their machines, and Linux will ever be a project, and the other option is an VirusOS.

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I', shiping mine to China, at Aliexpress found some services that bill 180 for doing everiting necesary to bring back to life the mac (reballing, gpu exch, other repairs, and DHL ship back), shipping only the logic board, or the whole laptop (30$ more).

Hey there guys,

prety sad that my first post has to be related to this but oh well. Same exact problems as everyone else. Early 2011 MBP, 15 inch, Radeon 6490M, purchased in Spain.

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Hi there Guys I also have the same problem, wouldn't boot, Graphics issues, and then eventually wouldnt turn on. it will boot now but I had to delete some of the graphics Kexts to force the use of the intergrated card, I am stuck on lion and have tried to upgrade to mavericks but after the apple logo all I get is a Lined blue screen,simular to that in the pic above, I need helpin fixing this, I have had many apple machines and would like it to work properly as now I cant install any new applications that require quartz Extreme and logic 9 will not open but I can still use 8, but would like to use x and I can nolonger use video editing, if Apple won't fix it I will nolonger support them and will return to a windows laptop even though it would be reluctantly, but productivity is very important to me and now this is just a very expensive below par machine which is less useful than my old g5 which still runs perfectly