Macbook Pro Freezing Problems

[TRK]

I have a 2.2 Ghz macbook pro with 2 gb ram and 10.5.6 installed. The computer is about a year and a half or so old. It came with tiger installed, but I upgraded to leopard a few months ago.

Lately, whenever I tried to play videos the computer screen would start flashing/flicker obnoxiously and freeze up after a few minutes of playing the video. Soon after, the screen would start flickering/flashing while surfing the web or using Word. Now, however, I get a message that turns the screen gray and says, “You need to restart your computer. Hold down the Power button for several seconds or press the Restart button” while booting up. This has rendered the computer completely useless.

Anybody have any idea how to fix this?

I read somewhere that the issues could be because of a kernel panic due to new software/hardware being used. I haven't installed any hardware to the computer. Software updates are:
2008-12-27 21:45:14 -0500: Installed "Safari" (3.2.1)
2009-01-31 13:48:17 -0500: Installed "Mac OS X Update" (10.5.6)
2009-01-31 13:49:22 -0500: Installed "QuickTime" (7.6)
2009-02-10 07:06:38 -0500: Installed "Keynote Update" (4.0.4)
2009-02-10 07:06:47 -0500: Installed "Pages Update" (3.0.3)
2009-02-10 07:06:59 -0500: Installed "Numbers Update" (1.0.3)
2009-02-21 07:26:17 -0500: Installed "Security Update 2009-001" (1.0)
2009-02-21 07:26:35 -0500: Installed "iLife Media Browser Update" (2.0)
2009-02-21 07:26:40 -0500: Installed "Java for Mac OS X 10.5 Update 3" (1.0)
2009-03-06 14:47:09 -0500: Installed "AirPort Client Update 2009-001" (1.0)
2009-03-06 14:47:13 -0500: Installed "Digital Camera Raw Compatibility Update" (2.5)
2009-03-06 14:47:21 -0500: Installed "iLife Support" (9.0.1)

I also have a diagnostic report from when the computer was working.

Any ideas would be greatly appreciated. I have already tried resetting the pmu and pram, but to no avail. I have also tried to load the leopard cd to run disk utility, but whenever I try to boot from the cd I get the same gray screen with the box that says to restart the computer.

 

[BlueRevolution]

It's a hardware problem, probably the graphics card dying. Did you buy AppleCare? Either way, sounds like it's time to go into the shop. Pray that it's not the logic board.

 

[Jethryn Freyman]

That's the NVIDIA graphics card failing, which means you need a new logic board. Covered by warranty, should be covered even without AppleCare because the GPU in that model Macbook is known to be faulty.

Take it back to Apple.

 

[TRK]

I went to the "genius bar" and the guy basically said that he couldn't do anything without sending it to apple central. All he said was that the computer was kernel panicking and that it would cost $100 just for him to find out what the problem exactly was.

I've since run the apply hardware test and it came back with a 4SNS/1/40000001: TBOT error. Can anybody make heads or tails of this?

 

[BlueRevolution]

I Googled the error code, and it sounds like the problem is either the graphics chip or a temperature sensor. Either way, it's a hardware problem and needs to be looked at by a hardware tech.

 

[Jethryn Freyman]

Based on the crash report, it's a failing graphics card, that exactly what my crash report said when it happened to me. When I ran the hardware test, though, it came up stating the "VideoController" was faulty.

Either way, it's a hardware issue, under AppleCare, it should be fixed for free. If not, Apple shouldn't charge you to diagnose the fault, especially since their hardware test came up with a conclusive result.