MacBook Pro Startup Beeps

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MacBook Pro Startup Beeps

Hi all,

I have a MacBook Pro 13 inch (Late 2011). I had upgraded my RAM back in December of 2012 from 4 GB (2x 2GB 1333 MHz DDR3) to 8 GB (2x 4GB 1333MHz DDR3 from Kingston). This summer the computer on startup began emitting 3 beeps randomly and sometimes on startup. I found where this is indicative of RAM issues and could possibly benefit from reseating the RAM, so I reseated the RAM. This seemed to solve the issue for a few weeks, but then it started again. Long story short this kept becoming more frequent, so I took the computer to an Apple Authorized Repair Center (there are no Apple stores close to me). They ran hardware tests and found nothing to be wrong. They suggested reformatting the hard drive as it could be a corruption in the OS X as I was running the El Capitan Beta. I backed up the computer and reformatted the drive reverting to OS X Yosemite. This didn't change anything about the behavior. I then filed a warranty claim on the memory and changed the memory out again. While the issue has happened less since changing the memory, it is still happening.

Has this been an issue for anyone else?

How can I go about fixing this?

Thanks for all you help!

MacBook Pro, OS X Mavericks (10.9)

Posted on Sep 29, 2015 4:55 PM

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Answer 1

Oct 2, 2015 1:21 AM in response to abskzf8109

I have the same problem. It happened with El Capitan GM and now with the final version. Sometimes the system just freezes while working and then it beeps 3 times. Sometimes the screen turns black and then it beeps 3 times. Sometimes it just reboots one or two times. There is no panic reports or something in the logs.

I did a full format of the SSD and made a clean installation of the final version of El Capitan (build 15A284) but it didn't help.

I did run the the long Apple Hardware Test and Memtest86 and nothing was found.

MacBook Pro 15 (late 2011)

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Answer 2

OGELTHORPE

Level 9

57,305 points

Oct 2, 2015 4:39 AM in response to abskzf8109

Have you tried an Apple Hardware Test?

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201257

Note that an error free AHT is not definitive.

I would take out the RAM modules and install only one in one slot and then the other slot. Do that with the other RAM module. This will test if a module is suspect or a slot is faulty.

Last, download from Kelley Computing Rember:

http://www.kelleycomputing.net/rember/

Run it overnight so that sufficient loops are executed.

Ciao.

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Answer 3

abskzf8109 Author

Level 1

0 points

Oct 4, 2015 7:48 PM in response to OGELTHORPE

I tried the AHT, but can't get it to run.

On testing the ram individually, sometimes it works well, other times it doesn't. Something happened the other night and I cannot boot from the internal hard drive now. I can boot from an external and have no issues with the ram at all. I can access the data on the internal HD, without issue, and disk utility runs a verification check and says everything is ok.

Thanks again for your help!

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