Killed my iMac, revived an old MacBook.

[Easttime]

So I thought I could get more years out of my 5 year old mid-2011 iMac by replacing the hard drive with a new SSD. I damaged something. LCD screen wouldn't light up. Shop said they had to replace the screen. Did that and it ran beautifully for 6 days, then started seeing the circle-slash gray screen, had corrupted drive. Took it to shop who ran diagnostic and said the hardware is fine. So I nuked the SSD and reinstalled the OS and my apps. Then bang, same problem only worse. My conclusion is that I wrecked something unhooking those four cables to the screen and created a cold connection gremlin. I doubt I'll find the thing and don't want to throw money at it.

Fortunately I had an old 2010 white MacBook and good backups so I was up and running pretty quick, but slowly. Also fortunately it is a piece of cake to DIY that MB so I upgraded the RAM from 4 to 16 and replaced the hard drive with an SSD. In spite of being SATA II the thing really zips along nicely. I picked up a high res 27" monitor and the old MB drives it fine through Apple's expensive dual link minidisplay to DVI adapter. So all good while I figure out the next step. Probably one of the new iMacs this fall. I'd be happy with a Mac Mini but the rumours there aren't hopeful.

Bottom line: I should have let the shop install that SSD. Thought my 25 years opening PCs meant I could crack the iMac. Nope.

 

[Oliverhay]

Aw that sucks. I'm currently debating wether I open a 2015 iMac to do the same thing. I take it that model has lots of adhesive and is even more fiddlley. Might have to give it a pass. I don't think they'll even do it at the shop if you ask.

 

[varian55zx]

Aw that sucks. I'm currently debating wether I open a 2015 iMac to do the same thing. I take it that model has lots of adhesive and is even more fiddlley. Might have to give it a pass. I don't think they'll even do it at the shop if you ask.

Interesting, there is a shop in my area.

Will do internal work on the 5k iMac, SSD installment, graphics card, but he is a true master of his craft.

 

[Oliverhay]

Interesting, there is a shop in my area.

Yea... In New Zealand, we don't even have a proper apple store... Support for these kind of things is quite average over here.

 

[varian55zx]

Yea... In New Zealand, we don't even have a proper apple store... Support for these kind of things is quite average over here.

Yeah, it's ok.

I'll sympathize with anyone from your neck of the woods facing this type of problem with their Apple products.

I would say I'd still recommend someone to buy Apple instead of PC, despite where they live.

 

[maflynn]

Bottom line: I should have let the shop install that SSD. Thought my 25 years opening PCs meant I could crack the iMac. Nope.

Bummer man

Yeah iMacs are designed to discourage people from opening them up. I've looked at the iFixit guides and I absolutely do not want to attempt this. I have a decent history of building, selling, and fixing computers back in the day, so I know my way around the insides of a computer but when Apple glues the case together, I know my limits.

Good luck in getting your iMac fully repaired.