Q: 2011 MacBook Pro and Discrete Graphics Card

Gavin , you and I are sitting pretty because we can always plug another graphics card into our mac pros ( which is part of why we bought them ). These poor  folk have to either do microsurgery on their motherboards or buy another laptop....   I would also be angry but as i said if its under 3 yrs i would be ringing all the time until i had satisfaction. regardless of country. After that i would cut my losses and buy another, but i sympathise....

Mine is dead since February 2013. Bought in july 2011. It was a full upgraded Macbook 3000Eruos worth.

I am really sad and only using Hackingtosh since then

Quick update - took my machine into the Apple Store last night. The genius confirmed immediately that it was the graphics card, all it took was for him to see the horizontal lines on the screen. He ran diagnostics on the computer and, other than the graphics card, the computer has a clean bill of health. Nothing wrong with any of the other components,

He offered to either repair it in house which would have cost an unknown amount, he just said it would be "more expensive", or he could send it out for a "flat rate" repair. Flat rate repair meaning that it would be sent out and fixed, regardless of the repairs my bill would be $310

This is inline with what I've been reading so, based on the amount of people who are reporting having their machine fail 3,4 even 5 times, I opted not to go this route and decided to get a new machine. It's definitely a blow and I don't have the money to just drop on a new computer like that, but I'm a freelancer and I earn my living with my laptop, so I don't really have a choice.

I really feel that Apple needs to answer for this and to be held accountable.

So there are now 3 of us that I've been able to count (though I haven't counted the whole thread) who have had this "replacement" occur -- 2 after multiple failures, and me on my first try, but after $322 depot repair.

The big question for me is whether these 2012 rMBP will have similar issues in another year?

The one difference I can see already is that the 2012 rMBP does not have its fans blaring nearly as often as my 2011.  I have SMCfancontrol running and will now monitor that more closely. 

I opted not to go this route and decided to get a new machine. It's definitely a blow and I don't have the money to just drop on a new computer like that,

Keep in mind that some of us have gone this route, and been offered refurbished 2012 rMBP for that $310 repair cost, after it gets to engineering.  Part of an Engineering Capture Program.

Of course, that isn't guaranteed, and I don't know how they choose?

And, as I mentioned in a previous post, you have to take into account costs of losing firewire, ethernet, DVD, and having a refurb rather than new machine

Definitely a thought, but I just do t have the time for it, I'm losing money without my computer and need to be back up and running by the end of the week.

One thought I had was that once I've recovered from the blow of an unexpected computer purchase, I may then take this 2011 MBP in for the repair and see what happens. Maybe I'll get lucky. Or, maybe at some point soon Apple will address this and I'll be able to get it fixed free of charge. Then I will have a backup for the next time one of my Apple computers takes a dive. (Seriously, looking back my wife and I have not had a good run with apple over the last 9 years. We've had major issues with 3 out of 5 of our major purchases)

For now I'm going to move in to one of the 13" MBP's.

It really does bum me out. This MBP is a monster. I maxed everything out when I bought it 3 years ago. I can't see sending a $2500 machine to the dump because of a manufacturers defect. Hopefully it gets resolved, for all of us.

same thing here:

iphone 4: no pb

Ipad 2: no pb

ipad air: no pb

apple TV: no pb

iphone 5: 3 replacement, during the last one I even had to stay 1 week without smartphone (such an easy thing today)

macbook pro 2011: down, waiting for apple to do something.

it means that1/3 of the product had problems.

Like you I am a freelancer depending on my MPB for my living. Not a good point for apple. I am really considering if it's worthwhile buying another apple product as they doesn't seems to be worth the price we pay for them.

And seeing what is happening with IOS8 (cellgate and now iCloud problem) is not helping apple in getting my trust.

Yep, my 2011 MBP has just gone down with the graphics card issue. There are some anecdotal reports of folks in the UK getting them fixed for free if they create enough of a stink. Has anyone had any luck? Thanks

Same for me....

MBP 17" early 2011. I spent almost a small fortune to buy it and now it is useless...

I used it for CAD software, started to heat up, finally it started crashing.

The local Apple service after suggesting that the hdd had to be replaced (with something I agreed since the cost was bearable), two days after the date they supposed to return it to me, said that the graphics card has to be replaced to.

It cost soooo expensive though... and since no one can reassure that the same issue won't happen again its impossible to have it fixed.

I am so disappointed! Pleeeeese do something! I cannot imagine that apple can leave such an important issue to go on....

Another one bites the dust.  2011 15" i7 MBP.  Wavy lines and now nothing.  Machine has been babied since I got it, rarely removed from my desk. 

Ridiculous.

One more unhappy mac user here.

My AMD Radeon HD 6770M in my 17" late 2011 MacBook Pro is failing.

I can boot without the AMD kernel extensions, but then I can't turn down the brightness and the machine will no longer suspend.

I am very disappointed. The machine is quite fast with 16GB of ram and a new SSD.

This sloppy soldering job ***** balls.

Add mine to the list. Early 2011, 15" i7 with the 6750m card. Tried playing Diablo 3 on Sunday and got the blue vertical lines. Tried rebooting and it hung during boot. Safe mode, recovery partition, Windows, all of them eventually hung with the blue lines before completing boot up. Brought it into the Apple Store (with multiple articles about the issue in hand), and after running diagnostics overnight, they've concluded the logic board needed to be replaced (which surprised noone).  $310 later, I should have it back in a few days. Pretty crappy that this issue still hasn't been acknowledged by Apple.

*** Add mine to the growing list.  Early 2011.  15" - 2.0 i7.  Was doing some photo editing in Bridge and ::::POOF::::.  I took it to Genius Bar after I had an outside tech look at it and confirm the GPU problem and she said (Apple Lady) she thinks it's a hard drive issue.  That's where they would start.  She sent me home to clone my drive (I'm just about 1 month post back-up) and invited me to come back as soon as I was ready for the new hard drive.  <---not really.

Another to add to the list. March 2011, I paid $2800 for my 15" MacBook Pro with the high resolution matte screen. I've been using macs since 1988, and this was my first laptop. I NEVER had a single hardware failure until now. I've never replaced a mac after only 3.5 years. I'm a freelancer too, with work due tomorrow, which meant a rush to the Apple store to get a new mac. I could do nothing to get it to boot, even from a cloned external hard drive. Thank goodness for time machine and backups. I hate to throw this mac in the garbage, and hate to think a repair might not last either. Very disappointed with Apple.

I have an early 2011 Macbook pro with an radeon AMD 6750M. I know that the Imac form 2011 with the same card have a replacement plan because of the AMD cards. Why do not the MacBook PRo with the same card from the same year have a similar plan? I think Apple should be responsible for that, the Applecare is out of range and someone who bought that cannot buy one to be covered. I am a macuser but i am starting to think that todays macs are not the same.