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parabel

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Aug 7, 2011
1
0
EDIT: Problem resolved, it was as simple as resetting the SMC chip! :) Still weird though, that the SMC just screws up like that out of the blue...

Hi!

I just got a call from my Dad about his MacBook Pro (older Core Duo model, not Core 2 Duo). That's why I couldn't yet check the problem out first-hand and the information is a little vague - sorry about that. It's running the newest version of Snow Leopard 10.6.8 and is generally up to date.

The issue: He turned the MBP on after being away and not using it for one week. He said it didn't boot properly and crashed a few times before even starting up. And the fan was very loud. He managed to boot into the User Interface once, and he said that the average system temperature in the status bar (Temperature Monitor from Bresink software) didn't show the usual ~60°C but was higher, and when he clicked on it to see the details, the temperature of the GPU was way up, around 90°C. CPU temperatures were rather normal, on the other hand.

He could hear a fan spinning, but I guess it's still possible that just the GPU fan died?
Or is there only one fan in the whole system and the problem must be somewhere else?
What could he do to find out more about where the problem lies?

Thanks a lot!
If necessary, I will drive the few hours and go check on his MBP personally, so if needed you can also post some advanced steps that a typical dad couldn't perform.
 
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