Q: 2011 MacBook Pro and Discrete Graphics Card

And another one bites the dust. Last night my nightmare happened, live on stage (I'm a keyboardist) my early 2011 mbp froze, cutting of my sound (mainstage). This forced me to my hardware backup rig which I always have in case something like this happens. I didn't try yet to force integrated graphics, but I'm quite unhappy (I'll choose my words carefully) that this happens to a 2400 euro machine that is barely 3 years old. I buy apple products because they should be reliable and last at least 5 or 6 years. Yes, at least! All I have now is a very expensive laptop I can't use anymore, writing of 800 euro a year (the cost of an average laptop yearly). If apple doesn't start a replacement program soon, it's exit apple products for me. Really disappointed right now, especially because I need reliable products because of the reason mentioned before.

So I wrote an email last night to Tim Cook before coming to that apple store today and today 1 hr before my genius appointment the escalations team from rim cook rang me and we talked it through he said as I was going in store today providing they find fault he has put a repair exception on my file and is happy for the  store to call him regards a free repair. so my faith in apple has been 90% restored.

Still not happy they aren't being proactive and sorting a perm fix for everyone and mightn't get a similar logic board with the same problem in a few months but my appointment is I'm 10 minutes so well see if their tests crashes it, hoping in store it fails lol it has been for days be embarrassed if it doesn't.

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Hi Nogi,

Any Tim Cook's email that we can refer?

I'm curious as well. This might suggest Apple is considering replacement/repairs..

Nogi,

Did you originally have AppleCare on your machine?  Even if it was already expired at the time you had the issue arise, it seems like that is sometimes a differentiator for Apple's response.

Also keep in mind that there were many who also went the path of emailing Tim Cook, were contacted by Executive Relations, and were basically told that they were out of luck (if not covered under AppleCare) and that Apple products are only warrantied for one year.  No acknowledgement of the issue and denial of anything posted on this forum.

Calvinogood wrote:

 

Hi Nogi,

 

Any Tim Cook's email that we can refer?

its easy to find via google search.

I had terrible issues with my iPhone 4s and writing to Tim resolved my problem. Definitely restored my faith in the company as well. Don't know what to do now with the laptop though.

Just got my MBP repaired and the logic board replaced. As a citizen of Sweden and thus the EU I made a European customer law claim. According to EU and Swedish customer legislation there is a 3 year warranty against manufacturing defects. The whole operation free of charge.

Hi Odedias,

There are so many fake emails on Google, no response after I've complaint my issue to 'Tim Cook' email.

Calvingood,

What have you done with your laptop so far?  Have you worked with Apple Support?  You can initiate an online chat to report the issue (select the option to waive the fee if you are not covered under AppleCare) and make sure that you make a note of your case number and copy the transcript (Apple does not have a feature to send a copy of transcript).

You can also provide some feedback here:  https://www.apple.com/feedback/macbookpro.html

I wish you luck. For people like me who've already been into an Applestore, pointed out this thread, clearly demonstrated the problem, and then been told it's the first I've heard of it, it's not a widespread problem as only a small proportion of a percentage of those MBPs sold are effected, there's no Repair Extension Program, the Warranty on the repair is only 90 days, etc. It's incredibly irksome that users have to play "games" to get the service that I believe we should all get, and even then it's at the whim of who knows who?

Like I imagine a great number of people who've posted to this thread, my computer is my job. It's why I've always bought Macs as the reliability tended to be good enough to justify the additional expense. If my computers is dead for anything more than a day I'm losing money. Every journey to an Applestore is time, which is money.

The time aspect is the reason I went down the route of getting a Reball (bga_repairs, 6 weeks, fingers crossed still chugging along happily) as I had clear understanding of cost, warranty and the time it would take.

It's not good enough that those that of you that have time to play 'customer support games' get different treatment. Apple should either come out and publicly state there is no manufacturing issue and no refunds or Repair Extension will every be made, or introduce a Repair Extension now. At least that way everyone knows where they stand and can make an informed decision about whether to get Apple or a 3rd party to repair.

Clive Sweeting wrote:

 

It's not good enough that those that of you that have time to play 'customer support games' get different treatment. Apple should either come out and publicly state there is no manufacturing issue and no refunds or Repair Extension will every be made, or introduce a Repair Extension now. At least that way everyone knows where they stand and can make an informed decision about whether to get Apple or a 3rd party to repair.

I completely agree. The Most frustrating thing about all of this is that us customers are just left in this Grey area with no idea what to do, whether or not to wait, or go to Apple or what.

Most annoying thing just being left to wonder.. Especially if, like me, you don't have any machine to use while waiting..

My late 2011 MBP has crashed in the same way here in Brazil. I am really mad about it, cause it costed me $3,300.00!!! I only payed the money cause I believed it would last longer than the **** that are usually sold here. ****, apple!! I'd better spent my money in a cheaper and expendable machine. Now, apple support asks me $1000.00 to repair it! No Tim Cook for me in South America. No customer law claim possible in Brazil. Just apple, and brazillian apple wants to ruin me! I am finished!! No more apple for me, I tell you!

<Edited by Host>

Apple just deleted my last message and their reason was that I was ranting because I said that nobody at Apple answered my e-mails directed to the Tim Cook address.

Apple: stating a fact is not ranting, just look at your own dictionary.

If Apple invested as much energy to solve the issue with the 2011 MBP as they invest in "managing" those forums, we'd all have new computers by now.

My MBP stopped booting yesterday as well (gray or blue lined screen).  I took it to the Apple Store today and apparently it needs a new main board and/or graphics board.  I asked if this was a common problem with this model/year since we have several of them and it seems to be "catching", the very nice guy said "No, not really -- we see it occasionally, but it is 3 years old".  Over $500 to repair in store or they could "send it out" for $320.  Seems like a problem with design or manufacturing if there are 426 pages of people complaining about the same problem...

I bought 3 basic $400 HP I3 Windows 7 computers about the same time I bought this particular $2500 MBP -- all the HPs are still going strong/haven't had any issues (use them almost daily).  I am very disappointed with the QA at Apple (this is not what I expected). 

Maybe Apple will still do the right thing?

Just received my early 2011 15 inch mbp from Country2City (Wales, UK) they replaced the GPU (AMD Radeon 6490m), picked up and shipped for a total cost of £110. It's now working perfectly. So far so good it also came with 6 month warranty and took just over a week to complete.