Q: MacBook Pro (Retina, Mid 2012) freeze with Yosemite

I'm not quite ready to chuck mine out the window but ... a week ago Apple returned my mid-2012 MBP retina. It qualified for the recall and they did extensive repairs - logic board, case, upper case and battery, heat sink and even a new lower case where mine had been very slightly dented. All at zero cost.  They returned the machine within a week. Over the last week, unfortunately, I have had several crashes. This morning I tested the automatic graphics switching toggle in Energy Saver. Two clicks and the machine froze. The cursor moved but no other action. I think I will operate with auto switching turned off but hope that 10.10.3 will clear this up because I've got an almost new machine.

I managed to install 10.10.3 beta (*) and I can confirm that it's fixed. Toggling GPU switching repeatedly no longer freezes it (previously it froze after two toggles) and had no crashes since.

(*) for those who don't get the 10.10.3 beta update in App Store, it's because you have the 2015-002 Security Update installed (this is an Apple bug). What I did was to download Yosemite from the "Purchases" section, then install it, then install the Beta Utility and then 10.10.3 beta appeared in the App Store for download. Installing Yosemite over Yosemite did not affect any of my apps or settings, everything was preserved.

Whoa! I was about to download the security update when I read your post. Thanks for the great timing. Two questions: Why is it necessary to reinstall Yosemite and what and where is the Beta Utility?

Jim

You need to register for the Beta and then download and install the Beta Utility in order for 10.10.3 beta to become available in the App Store. You don't need to reinstall Yosemite 10.10.2 before doing this unless you have installed the 2015-002 update (I had it and it was preventing 10.10.3 beta to show up in the app store, so i had to reinstall Yosemite 10.10.2 over the current one to fix it).

Thanks again. I'll hunt around for how one registers for the Beta but suspect I'll be back about that.  I'll let you know what happens.

Here's the link: https://appleseed.apple.com/sp/betaprogram/

Google "yosemite beta" ...

And thanks again. I won't be able to get to this until this evening but will get back to you.

James,

Are you in the US or the UK?

Interested to read that virtually your whole MacBook was rebuilt.

My local iStore said they will only replace the graphics card....

A new 10.10.3 beta has been released today (build 14D105g) ... they have possibly fixed the issue with update 2015-002, just register for the beta, install the beta utility and see if it shows up in the app store, if yes then go for it.

"I'm not quite ready to chuck mine out the window but"

I don't chuck things about, but I'm so frustrated with this problem with Yosemite that I honestly had the MBPr in my hand, arm out behind me, ready to launch it across the office.   I'm supposed to be doing work on it, but all I'm doing is fighting with Yosemite.   I'm willing to accept that sometimes something will need fixed in an OS or bit of software, but to have this going on for months isn't good enough.

I'm convinced too that Safari is leaking memory like nothing else too.   Closed it earlier because it's footprint was over 16GB.

Mavericks was superb; Yosemite the opposite.

I'm in the US but about 250 miles from the nearest Apple store. When I realized my machine was one of those affected I called Apple. They made a phone appointment; I had a long conversation with a trainee with a number of comments from her supervisor in the background. There was a long set of questions and conferences with the supervisor; at the end the supervisor said something like 'to the T' and the trainee told me they'd be sending a box for me to ship the computer to them in Texas. They must have a bunch of related problems and clearly they were applying a set of filters to sort out those they were going to recall and the terms of the recall.

So I went for it. I now have 10.10.3 beta installed. Played with the automatic switching toggle 19 times. (I find that prime numbers are always more reliable in these situations.) Everything is stable and seem faster. I'll let you know if things change. Thanks again for your help on this.

Having the logic board replaced made no difference for me - still getting the hard freezes, but they always happen when in Safari.

I've even gone to the lengths of installing a whole new copy of Yosemite, right from USB bootable pen-drive so not the upgrade procedure - again no difference.

Mavericks did this in the beginning but when they released 10.9.3 it went away, seems that the fix skipped Yosemite.

I had my LB replaced a few weeks back as well, and had a few crashes in the following days. I completely removed Silverlight and turned off the graphics switching, and haven't had a crash since. If you have Silverlight installed, remove it.

I'm loving all the positive news about the beta, so I'm looking forward to the public release and turning graphics switching back on!