Early 2011 MBP - NVRAM Resets

[Apple 26.2]

Good morning, everyone!

I've got an early 2011 base model MBP 15". She's always served me very well, but in the last two weeks, I've had to reset the NVRAM twice due to it completely freezing and becoming nonfunctional even with regular reboots - something I've never had to do in all the years I've owned her. I use Charlene mostly for Office, web browsing, coding (Python and Java with Jupyter Notebooks), Slingbox viewing... nothing I would consider super intensive. I have a new battery, SSD, and 16GB memory ready to install this weekend an effort to hold off buying something new.

I'm currently running Mavericks 10.9.5 (will install El Capitan on the new SSD) and I keep it as clean as possible (physically and digitally) - but what gives?

Thanks!

 

[maflynn]

but what gives?

Are you sure resetting the NVRAM is fixing the problem? Could it be that the dGPU is starting to fail, which is typical for the 2011 MBPs?

 

[Apple 26.2]

Are you sure resetting the NVRAM is fixing the problem? Could it be that the dGPU is starting to fail, which is typical for the 2011 MBPs?

Resetting NVRAM allows me to log in to the laptop and makes it functional. Nothing else I've tried (draining the battery, safe mode, etc.) makes it work again.

I thought it might be the dGPU, but I don't get the fuzzy vertical and/or horizontal lines indicative of dGPU failure (actually, never had that issue).