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User profile for user: markdoll01
markdoll01 Author
User level: Level 1
1 points

15" MBP Mid-2010 (6,2) SMC 1.7 Broke my MBP

Hi All,


My beloved 15" Mid 2010 MacBook Pro is not well and is sitting on life support and is only barely amongst the living. On the 23rd Feb 2013 I noticed the SMC 1.7 firmware update in my AppStore App (this firmware was released on the 13th of Feb if I can recall correctly) and unfortunately I clicked install.


The update started to install and then stated that my Battery should be charged (it was 100%) and power plugged in (it was) and requested a reboot to which I clicked yes. Started rebooting and installing the firmware and rebooted once or twice automatically and then after the final reboot, screen black and no Apple Power boot sound. I left it for 5mins and then thought ok, maybe its powered down. Pressed the Bower button and all I could hear was the CD-Rom powering and no display and no sound. I tried the PRAM reset, SMC reset but nothing. The following day I took it to our only Apple Center (Live in Windhoek,Namibia) in the Country. The next day they phoned and said that my Logic Board is faulty. I told them that my MBP was perfect until the stupid SMC update. They told me that I can leave a kidney and a peace of my liver as for the repair costs will be something like US$900 or I could buy a second hand Logic Board for something like US$500.


This is a no go for me as for all was fine up until the SMC update came through. As for I had nothing to loose now anymore, I opened the MBP and removed the Battery and with the power cord disconnected and holding the Power Button for a couple of seconds and while holding the Power Button, connecting the power cord and after a few seconds releasing the Power Button again, my MBP started up. Problem now is that my Fans run 100% and the keyboard backlight is dead and the battery does not charge nor is seen by the MBP. I can now switch it off an back on and my MBP will power up and boot into OSX. If I do a SMC reset (holding shift control option while pressing power button), I am back where I started - MBP not power on, but battery charges again etc. Doing the whole battery removal again with power button pressing and only then connecting the power cord, it starts again.


After booting into OSX, I had a look at my system profiler and now see that the SMC version is 1.70f6 and as per this page http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1237 , my version should have flash 1.58f17 - Seems like there was a bug in Apple's SMC 1.7 Firmware code it it thought that my 15"MBP was a 17"MBP and now my SMC does not talk propperly with my hardware it seeems. I maild the Apple Guys here in Windhoek about my findings and asked them to get in contact with the Apple Geniouses overseas to find out if they could downgrade the SMC again or if they have a fix, but they don't want to help and just sayed I must have a look on www.apple.com/support and downloads and search for my SMC version and install.


That does not work as for the packages just say its not for my version - well my version is not for my MBP!


Is there maybe somebody that can help me or should I just throw my MBP away, of maybe wait 2 years in hope that another SMC version will come out that will load the propper SMC code onto my MBP? Please Guys and Girls out there - any manual way maybe of forcing a SMC firmware downgrade or reapplying the propper code of version 1.7?


Please and keeping fingers crossed.

Mark

MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.7.1)

Posted on Mar 2, 2013 9:03 AM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply
User profile for user: markdoll01
markdoll01 Author
User level: Level 1
1 points

Posted on May 16, 2013 2:47 AM

Ok, it has now been three months since the last SMC 1.7 firmware update broke my mid-2010 15” MacBook Pro and having had it at two different Apple “Certified” technical centers and both told me that there is nothing that Apple can do except for replacing the Logic Board for something like US$ 500. I was not going to pay that amount for a 2010 MacBook to have its LogicBoard replaced so I unfortunately went out and bought a new MacBook Pro last month. Why unfortunately ............. BECAUSE I MANAGED TO FIX MY OLD MBP :-)


As of yesterday, I personally see a Apple “Genius” on the same level as the Petrol Attendants here in Africa that fill up your car! They know you need fuel to be able to drive your car, but that is where their knowledge or drive to figure something out stops. Ok, I am still very upset of having to fork out so much money for nothing. And yes, I do not like Apple personnel anymore, but I cannot live without my Apple machine (that is why I bought another when my old one was thought of being pushing up daisies).


I only managed to do this as for I had a brick lying around and I could not live with the idea that nothing can be done by recovering or downgrading the SMC firmware except for replacing the LogicBoard. I can also not imagine that Apple Personnel do NOT have a low level firmware recovery tool for the MBP 2010 and above models.


Ok, how did I fix it? By pure luck and by putting 1 and 1 together and getting 11 and not two :-)

If you happen to have a SMC firmware update that went bad on your machine, in my case the SMC 1.7 has three models SMC updates in one file and it loaded the wrong version onto my MacBook Pro, you can try the following:


Symptom:

MacBook Pro does not want to power up. You can only hear the CDRom making some noise and screen stays black and MBP powers off again.


Do this only if there is no other way around and when our of Warranty. Do this at your own risk.


The Fix:

  1. Disconnect power
  2. Open MBP and disconnect/remove the battery - close the back cover again
  3. While power is still disconnected, press and hold the power button for about 5 seconds and then while pressing and holding the power button, connect the power cable to the MBP.



If you are lucky, your MBP will now power up with the fans blazing at 100% and keyboard backlight will be off. This seems to be a recovery emergency mode or something. If you MBP did not power up, try again. If your MBP does not power up then you have a different problem and don’t need to continue the following steps.


  1. Boot you OSX and go onto the Internet and Download the right SMC firmware version for your MBP from: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1237
  2. Mount/Open the .dmg file and copy out the “Firmware”.pkg file.
  3. Use Pacifist or the command line to extract the content of the .pkg file.
  4. In my case the Apple SMC update had three models firmware in the .pkg file and the correct one for the Mid-2010 15” model was in the folder SMC18 or something. Find your correct model firmware for your MBP and copy out the following two files: SmcFlasher.efi and 2010MBP15.smc (the 2010MBP15.smc will be different for other MBP models)
  5. Copy those two files onto the OSX disk drive to a location that you can remember like /User/username/Dowloads/smc or where ever.
  6. Google and search for rEFIt . This is a boot loader app the will take over the boot process when you start up your MBP to enable you to go into a shell utility. Read up on how to install and how to activate the refit utility. When installed and enabled, the next time you reboot your MBP you will see the utility start up before your OSX boots.
  7. If you see the rEFIt utility start after you rebooted the MBP, use the arrow on your keyboard and select shell and press enter. The shell.efi utility will start to boot in a “DOS” like window and after you see something where it wants to configure or setup something, just press ESC to cancel that.
  8. After the util booted, you need to first change to your internel disk with the command “ fs1:” that is F S ONE Colon then Enter, standing for filesystem 1
  9. Now you can change to the folder to where you copied the two firmware files like :

cd Users

cd username

cd Downloads

cd smc


There are different ways of going to the folder or find the place where you put the files.

After finding the folder with the two files you can start the update process.

First need to get the SMC into the right state

SmcFlasher.efi -reset 1

Your MBP fans should now quiet down.

Lets Flash :-)

SmcFlasher.efi -force -LoadApp 2010MBP15.smc -norestart


Your SMC should now be flashing with the right version. Once done, power down the MBP. Power the MBP back on and do a SMC reset and all should be fine now. You can now connect the battery again and start using your MBP.


Hope this helps somebody. No Warranty and this is done AT OWN RISK!

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15 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply
User profile for user: markdoll01
markdoll01 Author
User level: Level 1
1 points

May 16, 2013 2:47 AM in response to markdoll01

Ok, it has now been three months since the last SMC 1.7 firmware update broke my mid-2010 15” MacBook Pro and having had it at two different Apple “Certified” technical centers and both told me that there is nothing that Apple can do except for replacing the Logic Board for something like US$ 500. I was not going to pay that amount for a 2010 MacBook to have its LogicBoard replaced so I unfortunately went out and bought a new MacBook Pro last month. Why unfortunately ............. BECAUSE I MANAGED TO FIX MY OLD MBP :-)


As of yesterday, I personally see a Apple “Genius” on the same level as the Petrol Attendants here in Africa that fill up your car! They know you need fuel to be able to drive your car, but that is where their knowledge or drive to figure something out stops. Ok, I am still very upset of having to fork out so much money for nothing. And yes, I do not like Apple personnel anymore, but I cannot live without my Apple machine (that is why I bought another when my old one was thought of being pushing up daisies).


I only managed to do this as for I had a brick lying around and I could not live with the idea that nothing can be done by recovering or downgrading the SMC firmware except for replacing the LogicBoard. I can also not imagine that Apple Personnel do NOT have a low level firmware recovery tool for the MBP 2010 and above models.


Ok, how did I fix it? By pure luck and by putting 1 and 1 together and getting 11 and not two :-)

If you happen to have a SMC firmware update that went bad on your machine, in my case the SMC 1.7 has three models SMC updates in one file and it loaded the wrong version onto my MacBook Pro, you can try the following:


Symptom:

MacBook Pro does not want to power up. You can only hear the CDRom making some noise and screen stays black and MBP powers off again.


Do this only if there is no other way around and when our of Warranty. Do this at your own risk.


The Fix:

  1. Disconnect power
  2. Open MBP and disconnect/remove the battery - close the back cover again
  3. While power is still disconnected, press and hold the power button for about 5 seconds and then while pressing and holding the power button, connect the power cable to the MBP.



If you are lucky, your MBP will now power up with the fans blazing at 100% and keyboard backlight will be off. This seems to be a recovery emergency mode or something. If you MBP did not power up, try again. If your MBP does not power up then you have a different problem and don’t need to continue the following steps.


  1. Boot you OSX and go onto the Internet and Download the right SMC firmware version for your MBP from: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1237
  2. Mount/Open the .dmg file and copy out the “Firmware”.pkg file.
  3. Use Pacifist or the command line to extract the content of the .pkg file.
  4. In my case the Apple SMC update had three models firmware in the .pkg file and the correct one for the Mid-2010 15” model was in the folder SMC18 or something. Find your correct model firmware for your MBP and copy out the following two files: SmcFlasher.efi and 2010MBP15.smc (the 2010MBP15.smc will be different for other MBP models)
  5. Copy those two files onto the OSX disk drive to a location that you can remember like /User/username/Dowloads/smc or where ever.
  6. Google and search for rEFIt . This is a boot loader app the will take over the boot process when you start up your MBP to enable you to go into a shell utility. Read up on how to install and how to activate the refit utility. When installed and enabled, the next time you reboot your MBP you will see the utility start up before your OSX boots.
  7. If you see the rEFIt utility start after you rebooted the MBP, use the arrow on your keyboard and select shell and press enter. The shell.efi utility will start to boot in a “DOS” like window and after you see something where it wants to configure or setup something, just press ESC to cancel that.
  8. After the util booted, you need to first change to your internel disk with the command “ fs1:” that is F S ONE Colon then Enter, standing for filesystem 1
  9. Now you can change to the folder to where you copied the two firmware files like :

cd Users

cd username

cd Downloads

cd smc


There are different ways of going to the folder or find the place where you put the files.

After finding the folder with the two files you can start the update process.

First need to get the SMC into the right state

SmcFlasher.efi -reset 1

Your MBP fans should now quiet down.

Lets Flash :-)

SmcFlasher.efi -force -LoadApp 2010MBP15.smc -norestart


Your SMC should now be flashing with the right version. Once done, power down the MBP. Power the MBP back on and do a SMC reset and all should be fine now. You can now connect the battery again and start using your MBP.


Hope this helps somebody. No Warranty and this is done AT OWN RISK!

Reply
User profile for user: tarnalcock
tarnalcock
User level: Level 1
0 points

Nov 29, 2013 1:58 AM in response to markdoll01

I have tried following the steps you mention as such:


1. Download SMC firmware update for my device

MacBook Pro (15-inch, 2.4/2.2 GHz)MacBookPro3,1MBP31.0070.B07 (EFI 1.5.1)1.16f11 (SMC 1.3)

2. Copy 'Firmware'.pkg file (macBookProSMCUpdate.pkg) to a folder.

3. CL extraction of pkg fl to another folder (xar -xf macBookProSMCUpdate.pkg)

-This gives me 3 files and one dir (MacBookProSLSMCUpdate.pkg, MacBookProSMCUpdate.pkg, Distribution, and /Resources/)

-I have now looked into all of the folders and the contents of the two pkg files liste above result in 4 files (Bom, PackageInfo, Payload and Scripts)


So. I cannot find either the .efi or the .smc file you mention.


Any possible workarounds?


Thanks for the informative post all the same.

Reply
User profile for user: tarnalcock
tarnalcock
User level: Level 1
0 points

Nov 29, 2013 6:19 AM in response to markdoll01

So Pacifist resolved that issue, thank you.


Two things:

  1. I now have the choice of m87.smc and m88.smc as the firmware files. How do I figure out which to use?
  2. When I run SMCFlasher.efi -reset 1 it tells me (not an exact quote but found this same error on the net which is basically the same):

"Warning you are not in the AppCode mode, but in "U" mode,

to enter in AppCode mode run SmcUtil.efi with the "-reset 1" option.

A note on this:


When I try and update the EFI using the supplied installer obtained via the same area as the SMC one, it does need to be installed but I am doing this bypass thing with the SMC (power button connect charger 10 sec hold etc.) so the system starts, the apple logo flashes up with a progress bar beneath it then immediately the system reboots normally into OS X and the installation promp still registers that it has not been installed.


I tried uninstalling rEFIt first that did not help.

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User profile for user: tarnalcock
tarnalcock
User level: Level 1
0 points

Feb 28, 2014 12:30 PM in response to markdoll01

So i dug the macbook out of the cupboard again hoping to try it after a break. Magically I was able to install the SMC fimware normally as downloaded from the apple website. (This being the same version that refused to install previously.)


Restarted and lo and behold keyboard lit up fans went quiet all seemed good!But my battery was still not showing and my wifi card also was missing. So I decided to unplug the magsafe (after shutting down) and start the system up again.


Unfortunately it has again reverted to its previous state where I need to bypass the SMC in the manner you described.


I then tried extracting the files and installing the SSMC using REFIt but it give me the same error I mentioned above.


I am now considering smashing the board in order to save myself the frustration!

Reply
User profile for user: gruu
gruu
User level: Level 1
0 points

Jan 22, 2015 9:10 AM in response to markdoll01

hello, I've got the same problem with one macbook pro mid 2010 (high speed fans, keyboard doesn't work, battery doesn't charge...) I had make everything you say but, when I type SmcFlasher.efi -reset 1 I can see SMCReset Result 0x0. When it happens, I type SmcFlasher.efi -force -LoadApp 2010MBP15.smc -norestart, the command reset the smc but when I rebbot the MBP the problem is still here.


Can anybody help me?

Reply
User profile for user: Rein van 't Veer
Rein van 't Veer
User level: Level 1
4 points

Jun 4, 2016 4:26 PM in response to gruu

Use the option without -norestart did the trick for me.


At first with -norestart and battery unplugged the battery was completely disabled.


With the battery connected and not using the -norestart option (so that the SmcFlasher would restart on its own all is back to perfect.


No loud fans, the only thing I'll have to do is to replace the keyboard because of water damage 😝 but that is only a 20 dollar cost + some hours to open and replace the keyboard ;-)

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15" MBP Mid-2010 (6,2) SMC 1.7 Broke my MBP

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