Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Apple says some MacBook Pros affected by faulty Nvidia chips
- Thread starter HiFiGuy528
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
I have one of the affected MacBook Pros. I paid for the repair a few months ago. My MBP was about a month out of the standard warranty.
It's a bit slow for a response, but I'm glad that they are at least responding now. I haven't been very happy about having to pay for the repair when NVidia had acknowledged a chip failure and the reports of MBP failures were quite widespread.
So, I guess I get to start the refund process now. Better late than never. The refunded cash will probably be going to a new MBP next week anyway.
It's a bit slow for a response, but I'm glad that they are at least responding now. I haven't been very happy about having to pay for the repair when NVidia had acknowledged a chip failure and the reports of MBP failures were quite widespread.
So, I guess I get to start the refund process now. Better late than never. The refunded cash will probably be going to a new MBP next week anyway.
I went to the Apple store today and the genius told me they will with a Rev 2 661-4961 Logic board and will be done in 1-3 days.
Do you have an affected MacBook Pro, or one that was made during this time? I spent $2500 on a notebook (as we all did give or take $500), I want to be assured it's going to work for a while at least. Yeah, sure, my analogy wasn't the best. But you get the idea. How do we know the part won't fail in the future? You seem to be so smart and above us so how about enlighten us oh wise one?
What do you think the resale value of a year-old MBP from within the covered range is compared to what it would be if there had never been this issue ?
I would feel allot better if Apple would start making the graphic card separate. I just got mine back from the shop, Now, I wonder if they used the same questionable graphics card for the fix? I have bought Apple for the last 15 years for the quality of their hardware. This makes me mad.....I have never thrown out a broken Mac, they have always just keep on goin'. I really hope Mac's dont start becoming disposable.
If they come out with a user replaceable video card for the MacPro's I may buy again. This experience has left me weary.... Fortunately I have 2 more years of Apple care.
If they come out with a user replaceable video card for the MacPro's I may buy again. This experience has left me weary.... Fortunately I have 2 more years of Apple care.
This obviously isn't good for Apple or those holding faulty notebooks, but lets keep it in perspective. This problem was related to a manufacturing process involving a lead solder that would fail at a high-temperature on the video boards. nVidia says they have made significant changes to the manufacturing process to keep this from happening and the boards that are failing were manufactured many-months-to-years ago. New macbooks/MB pros will no doubt be announced with nVidia chipsets. Assuming all the issues are worked out, it's a *POSITIVE* thing. nVidia's chipsets and integrated graphics chips are much more powerful than Intel's GMA. The graphics performance will be 2-3x faster, and all new nVidia chipsets have advanced hardware decoding of H264/VC-1 video with de-interlacing, iDCT, upconverting, noise reduction, etc.
1) Sell their products at a much higher margin
2) Be very conservative with choosing components, opting for longest reliability instead of performance.
Exactly.. six year warranty on a computer?? I wouldn't even want that because in order for Apple to provide that, they would have to:
1) Sell their products at a much higher margin
2) Be very conservative with choosing components, opting for longest reliability instead of performance.
"Note: If your MacBook Pro is not experiencing any of these symptoms, you do not need to contact Apple."
Says Apple
Well Unfortunately I read this as they are all potentially doomed and I'm going to need this remedied.
Repair it? what are they going to do? put in another 8600GT chip and hope that doesn't fail.
there goes the resale value.
Of course I'm not at all mad at Apple, just need to get this straightened out... no BS.
Says Apple
Well Unfortunately I read this as they are all potentially doomed and I'm going to need this remedied.
Repair it? what are they going to do? put in another 8600GT chip and hope that doesn't fail.
there goes the resale value.
Of course I'm not at all mad at Apple, just need to get this straightened out... no BS.
Unbelievable!
I've just splashed out on a refurb mac pro 3 weeks after my Laptop broke. Stupidly didn't buy Applecare and being out of warranty. I didn't think it would be worth repairing considering they were selling on ebay for the very same price a repair would cost.
Doh!
I've just splashed out on a refurb mac pro 3 weeks after my Laptop broke. Stupidly didn't buy Applecare and being out of warranty. I didn't think it would be worth repairing considering they were selling on ebay for the very same price a repair would cost.
Doh!
Keeping it in perspective I would read this announcement exactly the opposite. I would assume that new Macbooks and Macbook Pros would not have NVidia chipsets. Why would you publicly humiliate a supplier if you are getting ready to announce new laptops based on their chips?
I'm taking a wait and see on this. I didn't buy Apple Care on my MacBook Pro because I treat mine like, well let me explain:
I have a full body invishield and an incase hardshell cover over that, my keyboard has an iskin cover on it (never ever been touched directly) and there is a RadTech protective cleaning/polishing cloth that goes over that when I close the MacBook Pro. I only clean the screen and a couple of actual exposed areas with iKlear and when I travel with it there is an incase neoprene cover that goes over it before it goes into its hardcase. To say I protect my MacBook Pro is an understatement, most day old MacBook Pro's show more wear than my year old.
So this extension on my MacBook Pro's warranty is a huge sigh of relief. Even though I know a tech would never take as much care repairing it as I would. If it does go bad I might just ask for the logic board and do it myself, and add an SSD while I'm at it!
I have a full body invishield and an incase hardshell cover over that, my keyboard has an iskin cover on it (never ever been touched directly) and there is a RadTech protective cleaning/polishing cloth that goes over that when I close the MacBook Pro. I only clean the screen and a couple of actual exposed areas with iKlear and when I travel with it there is an incase neoprene cover that goes over it before it goes into its hardcase. To say I protect my MacBook Pro is an understatement, most day old MacBook Pro's show more wear than my year old.
So this extension on my MacBook Pro's warranty is a huge sigh of relief. Even though I know a tech would never take as much care repairing it as I would. If it does go bad I might just ask for the logic board and do it myself, and add an SSD while I'm at it!
I've gone through 3 motherboards and recently had my heat sensors replaced 6 weeks ago. Yet again I am experiencing my screen blacking out when my SR MBP overheats so when I talked to the Apple repair tech he put in the paperwork to have my laptop replaced with a brand new model. So I'm covered but am I worried that the current nvidia 8600 GT with 512mb ram to be also as flawed as the one I own now (8600 GT 256mb ram). No, but if it is I'll just take it back to Apple and have them sort it out.
This a reason why I'm skeptical of buying another macbook pro. I've been without a computer for nearly 5 months because apple wouldn't fess up to this problem.
That's a little comforting but not REALLY! So what if my MBP works till 2 years of purchase then nVidia fails on me...I'm SOL!
I agree Apple or nVidia should recall all of this faulty chips
I agree, my wifi sux and now my mbp is possibly a ticking time bomb for imminent video card failure.I hate Apple these days
I'm skeptical about the whole thing.
There seems that there might be some confusion involved with Nvidia and Apple's culpability,
I'm considering holding off getting it repaired as I'm not sure exactly how successful that might be at this point, even thought it would probably solve the issue.
But since they're so slow with acknowledgement maybe i'll give them some time to muster up full disclosure.
There seems that there might be some confusion involved with Nvidia and Apple's culpability,
I'm considering holding off getting it repaired as I'm not sure exactly how successful that might be at this point, even thought it would probably solve the issue.
But since they're so slow with acknowledgement maybe i'll give them some time to muster up full disclosure.
No, you think? Jeeze Stevey, good catch.
I hope they go with a viable ATI product...........................................
I hope they go with a viable ATI product...........................................
I have an "ATY,RadeonX1600" it has the same problem
and just in case you don't believe me, here's the photo:
(edit) ok photo is too big maybe later
and just in case you don't believe me, here's the photo:
(edit) ok photo is too big maybe later
tibook owner here. had two. both had the hinge-video wear-out/deadend problem. that's life. laptops are high wear and tear items. ordinarily, products - even electronics - have 1 year warrantees. personal electronics (walkmans, etc.) often have as little as 90 day warrantees. a laptop straddles the gap of installed/personal electronics. a two year warrantee isn't horrible.
does it suck? are these things really expensive and damned if there's high risk of breakage there? yeah. but i'd reckon that if you're scared of facing potential problems/breakage out of warrantee with your laptop, your best bet is the applecare extended warrantee, and if not that, then don't buy a laptop. you can always take notes with pen, paper and pocket recorder and work on your desktop later.
just saying. these are the risks; we all know the rewards. far as i know, they didn't offer extended repair warrantees on the tibook hinges, which in light of the frequency of this particular type of video failure are clearly a design defect whose fault is clearly apple's (not its suppliers). i'm pretty surprised and quite happy that they convinced nvidia to do this at all (because it's likely nvidia that's paying for (at least a portion of) replacement parts, after all).
not a fanboy, just a longtime user.
Apple closely monitoring its Discussion forums on this
Hmmm, I posted a new thread on the Apple discussion forum asking Apple to clarify a few things. It was not a flame at all, just sought some more information. It was almost immediately removed by whomever is in control of the Discussion area (Apple I presume).
Basically I said:
1) Apple can further clarify what MBP models are affected. What does "early 2008" mean exactly. They should be able to define what months of manufacture the bad chips were used.
2) The 2 year warranty has no value to "early 2008" purchasers who bought AppleCare. We only have the cost of lower resale value.
3) Ended by suggesting that Apple double AppleCare to 6 years for this problem -- since they doubled the 1 year warranty.
Before everyone goes nuts about "the cost" of item (3), let's remember that AppleCare is priced to profit for Apple. The more they sell, the better off they are. I think it very likely that an action like item (3) will end up long term increasing AppleCare sales. This would offset the cost of the extra warranty coverage -- might even be net positive overall.
An action like that would absolutely *underscore* the value of AppleCare. Hopefully issues like this are so far and few Apple will not have go this extra mile very often. So this is really a lemonade from lemons chance for them.
Overall, I thought my question for "Discussion" was important for the community. Only blame I laid was on NVidia.
Scary that they deleted it so quickly.
Really not feeling to good about this.
Figure resale price of my 6 month MBP has gone done a lot today.
Apple could help me and many thousands (tens of thousands) of others with greater clarity about what risks we face, what units are affected, etc.
They apparently are going to choose not to go this route.
Sad -- companies always seem to do this, and it almost always comes back to haunt them.
I hope the community doesn't just roll over on this one.
Additional clarification about the risks we face so that we can assess our costs/losses is important.
Other options may be chosen by more radical thinkers: class action (discovery might out who/what/when decisions and knowledge was available), or many might seek a process to ensure failure before the 2 years is up. Neither of this is good for Apple. History, though, has few examples of a company making the right decisions for its customer (hence itself) when such circumstances arise -- even though folks that study these kinds of things always recommend this approach.
Hmmm, I posted a new thread on the Apple discussion forum asking Apple to clarify a few things. It was not a flame at all, just sought some more information. It was almost immediately removed by whomever is in control of the Discussion area (Apple I presume).
Basically I said:
1) Apple can further clarify what MBP models are affected. What does "early 2008" mean exactly. They should be able to define what months of manufacture the bad chips were used.
2) The 2 year warranty has no value to "early 2008" purchasers who bought AppleCare. We only have the cost of lower resale value.
3) Ended by suggesting that Apple double AppleCare to 6 years for this problem -- since they doubled the 1 year warranty.
Before everyone goes nuts about "the cost" of item (3), let's remember that AppleCare is priced to profit for Apple. The more they sell, the better off they are. I think it very likely that an action like item (3) will end up long term increasing AppleCare sales. This would offset the cost of the extra warranty coverage -- might even be net positive overall.
An action like that would absolutely *underscore* the value of AppleCare. Hopefully issues like this are so far and few Apple will not have go this extra mile very often. So this is really a lemonade from lemons chance for them.
Overall, I thought my question for "Discussion" was important for the community. Only blame I laid was on NVidia.
Scary that they deleted it so quickly.
Really not feeling to good about this.
Figure resale price of my 6 month MBP has gone done a lot today.
Apple could help me and many thousands (tens of thousands) of others with greater clarity about what risks we face, what units are affected, etc.
They apparently are going to choose not to go this route.
Sad -- companies always seem to do this, and it almost always comes back to haunt them.
I hope the community doesn't just roll over on this one.
Additional clarification about the risks we face so that we can assess our costs/losses is important.
Other options may be chosen by more radical thinkers: class action (discovery might out who/what/when decisions and knowledge was available), or many might seek a process to ensure failure before the 2 years is up. Neither of this is good for Apple. History, though, has few examples of a company making the right decisions for its customer (hence itself) when such circumstances arise -- even though folks that study these kinds of things always recommend this approach.
yes: does anyone know how to determine build dates?
i just bought one of smalldog's NOS santa rosa 17" hi-res 2.6C2D machines, and would love to know where it falls on the timeline (although it's undoubtedly at least "early 2008" if not late 2007). what to look for in the serial no. or elsewhere?
thanks for your advice.
Apple's announcement can only mean one thing. The problems became too much for them to ignore any longer.
While there is no recall, for obvious reasons it would cost them way too much.
The only silver lining I can say comes from it is that no longer will anyone have to deal with geniuses at the Apple store give lame excuses or pretend that it is not a problem.
While there is no recall, for obvious reasons it would cost them way too much.
The only silver lining I can say comes from it is that no longer will anyone have to deal with geniuses at the Apple store give lame excuses or pretend that it is not a problem.