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Apple says some MacBook Pros affected by faulty Nvidia chips
- Thread starter HiFiGuy528
- Start date
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You are missing my point and oversimplifying in this post of yours as well as your earlier post. I don't expect Apple to warranty every piece of a complicated machine forever. Stuff fails. What upsets me is that the GPU now falls under the category of "known faulty" parts, and Apple chose not to do a recall; they chose to cover them one-off as they fail. If these choose this path, they should warranty this known-faulty piece for the life of the machine, or at LEAST for more than what AppleCare gets you anyway. How do I resell this machine if the piece hasn't been replaced? Apple has put me in the position of either doing nothing, hoping that the GPU doesn't fail, or doing something to cover my own butt. Covering my butt means either purchasing a lengthy AppleCare warranty, for something Apple should be covering, or forcing a replacement by month 24. Yes it's nutty to intentionally break my machine but Apple hasn't left me many good options. And to be honest I'm kind of hoping that a groundswell of people trying to break their machines would clue Apple in to changing their policy, but that's the dreamer in me.
Mine showed eratic behavior once on bootup from sleep in which I nearly cried (lol). Restarted and it was fine.
I'm not going to bork my machine on purpose, even though in this particular instance, we know the component is PRONE to failure. It is much different to say that the chips ARE affected than to say they are some that may break down. Apple has just waved a white flag and pretty much says it'll break down, but hopefully it will within 1 or two years, which I'm not ok with.
I LOVE my 2.6 Penryn desk-laden-since-birth machine.
-but-
if it dies on me, i'll have no problem demanding an "upgrade" (read: rev A q4 mbp) for my externally pristine model. Do I deserve one? No. Do I deserve to live in fear of doing any graphic intensive applications for the PRO machine i've purchased? Absolutely not!
I'm not going to bork my machine on purpose, even though in this particular instance, we know the component is PRONE to failure. It is much different to say that the chips ARE affected than to say they are some that may break down. Apple has just waved a white flag and pretty much says it'll break down, but hopefully it will within 1 or two years, which I'm not ok with.
I LOVE my 2.6 Penryn desk-laden-since-birth machine.
-but-
if it dies on me, i'll have no problem demanding an "upgrade" (read: rev A q4 mbp) for my externally pristine model. Do I deserve one? No. Do I deserve to live in fear of doing any graphic intensive applications for the PRO machine i've purchased? Absolutely not!
Finally.
My MacBook Pro (2.2GHz, Geforce8600) and I have been suffering a great deal from these graphics glitches for more than a year now.
Looking forward to returning it.
My MacBook Pro (2.2GHz, Geforce8600) and I have been suffering a great deal from these graphics glitches for more than a year now.
Looking forward to returning it.
I don't think you can return it. I think they repair it.
I'm gonna go to my local Apple Store tonight and see what the deal is. Whatever it is, I'm gonna find out what I can do after tuesday.
That is an assumption on your part, one that may or may not be true. Yes, it's very popular to throw all corporations under the bus. But here are the facts as I know them.
- Some number of months ago Nvidia made public a problem with some GPUs
- Some other vendors that used Nvidia GPUs publicly recognized the issue as well
A - Apple did not recognize it publicly until just now.
- Apple claims that NVidia told them that their parts were unaffected
- At no point has NVidia said that all of the GPUs will fail, only that all have the same defect
You have to assume that Apple was covering this up and continues to lie about it in order to have your scenario hold true. And it could very well be a cover up, but you have no evidence of it, only your anger.
If Nvidia did tell Apple that they weren't affected, then Apple had no responsibility to proactively recall or add warranty to anything.
It all comes down to "cover-up or not". If it's a cover-up, I'm on your side. If it's not a cover-up, then Nvidia is on the hook to cover parts according to THEIR warranty with Apple, and hopefully Apple extends its warranty further.
Odd.. I've got two March 2008 MBPs here and have never had even so much as a corrupted graphic out of them.. Must be lucky.
heres a youtube video of my macbook pros screen one night.
its happened a few times now. its quite amusing but also a bit worrying.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JsnM8CU8fqs
its happened a few times now. its quite amusing but also a bit worrying.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JsnM8CU8fqs
Yeah, me neither. Now I'm wondering if I shouldn't just say it's messing up just to ensure I have one that isn't defective and won't mess up somewhere down the road.
Anyone know if they'd somehow "upgrade" it to a newer MacBook Pro that's released next week (assuming I brought it in then)?Exactly. If something goes wrong with a car, the entire affected product line gets recalled whether or not there's been a problem. They don't replace it as the problem comes.
Ford: "Oh, your Ford F-250 has a bad wire in the engine so it might randomly set fire. Let us know if it does."
Customer: "Oh, ok." *few months pass by*
Customer: "So hey, that wire caught fire and my trucks totaled now."
Ford: "Aw yeah, was afraid of that. Ok,, let's go ahead and fix that wire."
If that works, let us know! Would be nice to catch a Apple Store manager on a day when they want to share their happiness with the world....
To be honest, that analogy is completely bollocks. For a start the GPU failing is not going to total your MBP, set it on fire, damage other components, or anything like that. OK, the screen may glitch or even not show any video, but it is an isolated fault. Secondly the GPU failing will not kill you. That is why auto manufacturers have to issue recalls. Because the fault can cause a loss of life.
Anyway the problem is not happening in all MBPs. It might happen but is not guaranteed to happen. Most will work fine and exhibit no symptoms, but for those that do, Apple are going to sort it out. Quit whining.
I suffered from a faulty graphics chip about 1 month out from my 1 year warranty. Apple New Zealand fixed it no problems.
Details of the problem:
Machine is the 17" Macbook Pro 2.4GHz, with the 1920x1200 high res screen option, and 4GB of 3rd party RAM from macsales.com. Graphics card is the GeForce 8600M GT.
Primarily occurs while playing 3D games in particular Unreal Tournament 2004.
Used successfully for just over 1 year without problems.
Fans don't appear to be coming on to full speed like normal.
The screen below occured during a short hardware test. Computer appeared to keep working and test finished with display artefacts. When playing UT2004 computer becomes unresponsive. Keyboard lights still work. Sound loops or stops.
Here are more images of what it was doing:
test.powersite.co.nz/macbook_pro_corruption/
Details of the problem:
Machine is the 17" Macbook Pro 2.4GHz, with the 1920x1200 high res screen option, and 4GB of 3rd party RAM from macsales.com. Graphics card is the GeForce 8600M GT.
Primarily occurs while playing 3D games in particular Unreal Tournament 2004.
Used successfully for just over 1 year without problems.
Fans don't appear to be coming on to full speed like normal.
The screen below occured during a short hardware test. Computer appeared to keep working and test finished with display artefacts. When playing UT2004 computer becomes unresponsive. Keyboard lights still work. Sound loops or stops.
Here are more images of what it was doing:
test.powersite.co.nz/macbook_pro_corruption/
Well I'm a DJ and I use my MBP exclusively for DJ and Video DJing and pretty much my whole career depends on keeping the computer running as sharp as a knife.
If it crashes during a performance, I'm ****ed. I'm contacting apple and demanding a full new replacement.
If it crashes during a performance, I'm ****ed. I'm contacting apple and demanding a full new replacement.
Maybe it's a bad analogy, but I'm not quite sure it constitutes "whining." At any rate, for me, the point is that Apple is providing a mere extra year on top of the one year warranty to replace this part, when they know there's a problem with the chips. As I said above, I've already had two GPUs go, one in about a month. I know that my experience hardly means proof that the problem is widespread, but still, I know I won't have this machine in my possession a year from now.
I'm so glad I sold my 17" mbp that fell under those terms.. even though apple will fix or replace the logic board (1 additional year on top of the factory 1 year, which I still wouldnt say its a safe bet), I did not want to deal with getting it repaired, swapped with the logic board and the lottery on when the gpu will crash,die, etc...
I wonder if I'm in the clear, as I have a 2.6 ghz MBP with the 512 MB 8600 (not on this list).
I haven't had any video problems with it yet, though at home I keep it on a wire shelf for optimal cooling.
I haven't had any video problems with it yet, though at home I keep it on a wire shelf for optimal cooling.
You are comparing recalls that are not alike. Your example is more like Apple's recall of iPhone power adapters, which were all recalled for a safety issue. Most auto recalls are also for safety issues. This graphics card is not a safety issue, and evidence to date suggests that not all cards are or will be affected (in spite of inflammatory comments made by the Enquirer). I suspect that NVIDIA has told Apple that it will pay for the replacement of all defective cards for a limited period, and Apple is passing this replacement extension on to its customers. NVIDIA has clearly not budgeted to recall and replace all of the potentially affected parts, as per its quarterly statement.
OK - for me this raises more questions than it answers.
I have a machine bought in April this year, but was the previous revision, so right in that late 07 - early 08 timeframe.
Had been experiencing the symptoms read about here - distorted text when scrolling, and white flashes when watching flash video online, or when skimming over iPhoto events, or browsing ITMS.
Had recently showed signs of escalating, with at least one instance of a completely garbled screen, and a couple of garbled screen within the coverflow window in finder.
However, since installing 10.5.5 these symptoms have completely gone - an experience shared by others if the threads on the Apple support forums are anything to go by.
So all of this begs the question - were these symptoms related to this nVidia issue in the first place, as was widely speculated?
And if they were, then what has 10.5.5 done to address them?
And if 10.5.5 has addressed them, it seems odd timing for Apple to now admit the issue.
I have a machine bought in April this year, but was the previous revision, so right in that late 07 - early 08 timeframe.
Had been experiencing the symptoms read about here - distorted text when scrolling, and white flashes when watching flash video online, or when skimming over iPhoto events, or browsing ITMS.
Had recently showed signs of escalating, with at least one instance of a completely garbled screen, and a couple of garbled screen within the coverflow window in finder.
However, since installing 10.5.5 these symptoms have completely gone - an experience shared by others if the threads on the Apple support forums are anything to go by.
So all of this begs the question - were these symptoms related to this nVidia issue in the first place, as was widely speculated?
And if they were, then what has 10.5.5 done to address them?
And if 10.5.5 has addressed them, it seems odd timing for Apple to now admit the issue.
Oh, I meant "return it" as in taking it back to the shop.
"Return it" not "Replace it".
They are included, note in the statement in the article
"They include the MacBook Pro (15-Inch, 2.4/2.2GHz), MacBook Pro (17-Inch, 2.4GHz), and **MacBook Pro (Early 2008).**"
An Early 2008 Macbook Pro are _all_ Penryns.
I have experienced this problem (jaggies in the graphic elements on the screen, a few KPs), and just had my MBP in to the Apple Store to get fixed under warranty, before this was admitted to by Apple. I have the 2.4GHz Core 2 Duo, "Mid 2007" (http://support.apple.com/kb/SP17) . It took 12 days to get it fixed, but am of course glad it's over with.