MBP (mid-2010) screen issues

[whitenoise]

I recently, (a month or two ago), updated my ageing mbp with a SSD drive and installed Mavericks.

A couple of days ago, while using my mbp, the screen suddenly became like a grayscale checkerboard. I can see whats supposed to be on the screen, but it is obscured and tricky to read. I have had a quick route around and am sad to hear it seems to be part of a known issue.

Is there anything I can do to repair/get this repaired. As I'm in the UK and about 100 miles from the nearest applestore I cant just pop in and ask for help. I have tried holding down d at startup, but don't seem to get diagnostics. My next move was to put the original drive back in the mbp and see if it will work from there.

Any advice on my next steps? I have a "As New" mbp with a healthy battery that has become next to useless. :'(

 

[Samuelsan2001]

I recently, (a month or two ago), updated my ageing mbp with a SSD drive and installed Mavericks.

A couple of days ago, while using my mbp, the screen suddenly became like a grayscale checkerboard. I can see whats supposed to be on the screen, but it is obscured and tricky to read. I have had a quick route around and am sad to hear it seems to be part of a known issue.

Is there anything I can do to repair/get this repaired. As I'm in the UK and about 100 miles from the nearest applestore I cant just pop in and ask for help. I have tried holding down d at startup, but don't seem to get diagnostics. My next move was to put the original drive back in the mbp and see if it will work from there.

Any advice on my next steps? I have a "As New" mbp with a healthy battery that has become next to useless. :'(

Yep that sounds like a video card death, there is nothing you can do short of a logic borad replacement if thats the case. If your little town is anything like mine (eastbourne) you'll have one or 2 apple authorised computer repair places close to you. They'll be able to diagnose the problem but a logic board is looking at about £400-£500 to replace.

At that age you'd be better off putting the money towards a newer computer by far though.

 

[Jozone]

Yep that sounds like a video card death, there is nothing you can do short of a logic borad replacement if thats the case. If your little town is anything like mine (eastbourne) you'll have one or 2 apple authorised computer repair places close to you. They'll be able to diagnose the problem but a logic board is looking at about £400-£500 to replace.

At that age you'd be better off putting the money towards a newer computer by far though.

Unfortunately, this is pretty sound advice.

I would still venture off to the Apple store to get the official quote of the logicboard. Depending on price you may just want to sell this machine off for parts (everything short of the logicboard should still be good).

 

[whitenoise]

Well thanks thats as depressing as I was expecting it to be.....

On a plus note. I have swapped out the SSD and put my original HDD back. I then managed to run the "D"iagnostics tests, but no problems were found. Instead of artifacting straight away, (as it did in Mavericks), under Snow Leopard everything was fine until I opened the browser.

I installed a program "gfxcardstatus" and set it to intel only and it seems to have fixed the issues, for the time being. I guess I have a mbp I can use for browsing and probably most of the basic work I would be doing. Im not entirely sure how hard the integrated graphics can be pushed/what will make it crawl, but as long as this holds up I've got some sort of functionality.

I'm still going to get around to contacting Apple, (I would prefer by email, but I'm not sure if I'll have to phone). I guess I cant expect anything else but a bill for £400 and the hassle of sending the mbp away for repair, so maybe I'm just better being greatful that I've managed to get a workaround.

Thanks for the help btw.

 

[MacCubed]

What browser do you use?

 

[whitenoise]

Depends what I click on, but mostly chrome. I've never had any issues using chrome before. Note that the graphical fault is not limited to the browser window, as soon as the browser is opened the entire screen glitches.

If you have any further ideas I'd be happy to entertain them. If i had a bashed/thrown around mbp, that had been over taxed/over worked, I would put it to sleep. While its sitting here, a pampered/as new mbp its a bit of a niggle that I can't use it to its full........anyway.

 

[MacCubed]

Depends what I click on, but mostly chrome. I've never had any issues using chrome before. Note that the graphical fault is not limited to the browser window, as soon as the browser is opened the entire screen glitches.

If you have any further ideas I'd be happy to entertain them. If i had a bashed/thrown around mbp, that had been over taxed/over worked, I would put it to sleep. While its sitting here, a pampered/as new mbp its a bit of a niggle that I can't use it to its full........anyway.

I've read the chrome causes these glitches sometimes. Try safari and report back

 

[whitenoise]

Yep to some degree your correct. Switched back to dynamic and tried safari and it seems to open fine; opened with chrome and instead on checkerboard got basically four thick vertical lines with some smaller interspersed blocks, black, white, black, white. V.Strange.

I forced closed and restarted, put back to intel only, and both safari and chrome seem to work fine.

Note that now I seem to be getting artifacting in Snow Leopard at start up, (sections of checkerboard across the screen), until the gfxcardstatus app kicks in, I suppose. Once that happens the artifacts disappear and you would think nothing was wrong.

 

[MacCubed]

That is really strange, Apple does currently offer a replacement program for 2011 MacBook Pros that have this issue. If yours is a 2011 and not a 2010, you could get it replaxec

 

[whitenoise]

Unfortunately not, mid 2010 is what I have. I must contact apple, see what they say, how much a repair will cost etc. Im sure Samual and jozone are correct, its a fault that seems to have popped up a lot, but mine has just taken longer than most to occur. I have most likely missed the boat on the free replacement and its not really worth paying for it to be fixed.

I mostly use my mid 2011 27" imac at this point anyway and I'm glad I haven't upgraded the OS or other seemingly innocent thing yet. It will sit happily with Snow Leopard as long as it holds itself together.