Q: 2011 MacBook Pro and Discrete Graphics Card

I was told that my MBP is back from Apple with the logic board replaced and will be returned to me in few days, so too late to ask for the reballing option, though again, I don't know much and I'm most stupid, but wouldn't they have to reball whatever it is that needs reballing while changing the logic board? This whole affair is too confusing for my liking and I wish Apple grew a pair and came up with a clear policy. In the meantime I'll have to wait and see how it all goes come Friday (I understand Apple gives 3 months worth of warranty for all new parts, so I should expect it to fail soon after).

My early 2011:   DF8Y

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I am at a loss for words at the moment. I sent out my mbp today for a logic board replacement. It will be unbelievably expensive!! I've made a couple of different complaints to apple support in regards to issues that ended up being related. I reached out to the Apple employee in regards to a possible making this a known issue eligible for no-cost repair and they had this to say:

"I certainly understand how you feel about the Logic Boards and I would have to say that even though there are posts on the Apple Support Forums from other users experiencing this issue that this would be still a minority. When we have something happen where we know there are parts going into a machine that are not up to our quality standard we are notified by our engineers about these to get the parts replaced as soon as possible."

This is verbatim from a senior advisor. It sounds like there are no plans to raise this to a known issue. There is no excuse. At a million views and 8,000 replies that all seem to be related to the gpu or the logic board, action needs to be taken by the manufacturer. Especially one that puts their customer service at such a high priority.

This machine is only slightly older than three years. I feel slighted and take personal offense. This was my dream computer when I purchased it and it has been problem after problem which all have steamed from the logic board.

My "JunkBook Pro", purchased end of 2011, failed mid of 2013 because of GPU overheating. Same as many of visitors of this forum, I gave it for the (expensive) logic board replacement and after about six months it failed again with exactly the same problem.

"Senior advisor" of apple care told me on the phone that it is "coincidence" that both logic boards where failing and that there is no issue with series of the macbook pro... Apple is completely ignoring the fact that there are so many people complaining about the same issue. Even worse, Apple is actually making money out of it.

It seems that this case can be solved only if people team up to bring it to the justice...

As for my part, I decided to stop purchasing apple products, unless they make the swap (of the expensive useless junk they sold me) free of charge.

I can't believe you had two failures! This makes me extremely worried about the money I'm about to put down when mine comes back. What all symptoms did you have before the first and second failures?

Why Apple do not take action??

I had same symptoms as many in this forum: sudden shutdown, the grey lines on startup, blue lines and no boot... Sometimes it was possible to boot, but as soon the application requests more GPU power, computer freezes with blue screen, or split screen, or shuts-down. When the notebook was broken first time, I was also experimenting - I was able to boot windows in "safe mode" and disable radeon graphic card, which only confirms broken GPU.

As you already ordered the replacement, I can only advise you: do not use it for lot of demanding graphical work, I can assure you GPU will be broken again, it is just matter of time... and, from now on, do not buy Apple products any longer.

Had a MacBook Pro for about 3 years now. I was "lucky" enough to buy the early 2011 (15", 1680 high-res matte display, 2.2gHz i7) which if you do a simple Google search, most results will either say something along the lines "poor those who bought that piece". Immediately after I have received it in 2011 (bought it through my university but was not awarded the discount!) it started acting up and glitches in the display would scramble the image making it completely inoperable or it would not boot up at all due to GPU problems. Since then I have spent many many days without a laptop (it's been 4 times in service) and I've gone through 2 Logic Boards and 2 Batteries however, to emphasise the competency of Apple they have replaced my display with a 1440 glossy display just because. Not only that but the device would constantly be hot for absolutely no reason at all. After about one hour of gaming, one day the plastic keys became soft and I have managed to almost go through the ESC key. I have had many laptops before and having had "some" problems (becoming slow after 1 year - nothing compared to this though, never had any failures of any kind) with the windows devices I decided to switch over to a Mac even though it was 3x more expensive.

I have called and complained about it many many times and all they seem to say is "we'll need to get it inspected" meaning that I end up looking at a wall for about a week, how is that for customer service?

What you will probably have to do is get it into the store, leave it there for about a week to change everything what's inside (logicboard, gpu etc) and then get it back and wait for it to happen again.

Hopefully this helps, however you and me were both in a bad batch I suppose

This is my update:

Reballing the GPU & replacing the GPU did not work! So people need to be aware these repairs by independent techies do not always work!

I was offered the option of replacing the logic board at cost of $500 but declined. The reason being new logic boards are failing also!

Now I will probably buy a min mac for £499 or go back to PC, at least with PC you know it will fail in 2 years but it's cheap.

I also had a call back with apple. The guy said return it to where you bought it which is not possible as I'm in UK and I bought it in USA.

In the UK he said we are covered by 6 year Consumer Law which might help some people. He also advised claiming on house insurance!

No real solution or help just a waste of $3000!

JPH39

Did you not receive a warranty with your reball? Most good shops are offering a one-year warranty... couldn't you act upon that warranty?

Clinton

MacBook Pro (15-inch Late 2011), OS Mavericks 10.9.4, 16GB Crucial RAM, Crucial M500 960GB SSD, 27” Apple Thunderbolt Display

Hi!

the reballing did not fix the GPU, he also replaced the GPU which did not work either.

So the last resort is a new logic board and they are very expensive.

Even if you replace the logic board there is no guarantee it will fix issue.

I will definitely not buy another macbookpro for £2000 which will last 2.5 years!

JPH39

But did you not receive a warranty from the shop that did the repair? While I've seen some shops offering only a 3-month warranty, the shops that are confident about their work are offering a one-year warranty... surely you could call the shop and tell them that the reball failed and that you expect them to fix the machine as the rebel and CPU replacement failed?

Clinton

MacBook Pro (15-inch Late 2011), OS Mavericks 10.9.4, 16GB Crucial RAM, Crucial M500 960GB SSD, 27” Apple Thunderbolt Display

The laptop was never fixed in first place, the guy admitted he could not repair it. So he thought it might be burnt track on logic board!

definitely a manufacturing fault which Apple are not admitting to.

JPH39

Oh! Now that's a different story! I'm not certain what a "burnt track on logic board" means but if there is some other defect with the logic board, other than the problem that people on this thread are having, then, no, a reball probably wouldn't help. If you've had Apple techs look at the machine, I would (were I you) get a definitive report on what, exactly, the problem is on the logic board. Then you can decide if you want to repair, replace or buy a Windows machine.

Good luck,

Clinton

MacBook Pro (15-inch Late 2011), OS Mavericks 10.9.4, 16GB Crucial RAM, Crucial M500 960GB SSD, 27” Apple Thunderbolt Display