Odd screen glitches in Snow Leopard. GPU Fault?

[mpfef]

Well, I'm positive it has something to do with Safari. I've tested using Safari (and Webkit nightly builds), and if I use either one for a length of time, eventually I'll get the graphics corruption. If I stick with Chrome or Firefox (or Opera), it NEVER happens.

I tried using the 10.6.3 combo updater, and before that the 10.6.2 combo updater hoping to 'wipe' whatever problem there was off the computer, but at this point I'm not willing to do a fresh install in the hope that it'll fix the problem.

--Matt

 

[MrCheeto]

Agreed ^

 

[max¥¥]

the problem is probably a graphics driver problem, i have had the same problem on a power mac g4 before installing the drivers and on a hackintosh netbook with a odd resolution that mac os dose not always seem to like

 

[Eidorian]

Has anyone else tried to killing the Dock via Terminal (killall Dock)? I just did so to accomplish another task and my graphical issues disappeared the moment I did.

 

[slapguts]

Has anyone else tried to killing the Dock via Terminal (killall Dock)? I just did so to accomplish another task and my graphical issues disappeared the moment I did.

I've been using the 'switch resolution' trick, but next time it pops up (any minute now) I'll give that a try.

UPDATE: Killing the dock did the trick.

 

[Jolly Jimmy]

Flash in Safari definitely seems to have something to do with it.

Killing the dock is a nice swift solution, cheers for that Eidorian

 

[Eidorian]

Killing the Dock only works sometimes when I try it. I had luck with it once.

 

[grahas]

I am getting them too

I am getting the same problems:

Black Late 2007 Macbook 2.2ghz 4gigs of ram 260gb hd


hellllp

 

[Eidorian]

I forgot to mention these today at the AASP!

 

[jgbhardy]

I've actually been getting Kernel Panics when using Safari and the reports link it back to the Graphics Driver. So I've now stopped using Safari and started using Chrome and even now removed Safari from my Dock.

 

[Eidorian]

I haven't encountered this issue in the first day with my new logic board. I got a new fan and bigger hard drive as well.

 

[jgbhardy]

Ok I haven't used Safari since my last post and I have been using Chrome, I have had no more graphical glitches! Clearly this is something to do with Safari as beforehand I would be encountering glitches every hour.

 

[Macmaniac411]

I've been having this problem for months, i truly believe it is a problem with snow leopard and flash player 10.1. In January when i upgraded to the beta of 10.1 i was getting the glitches, i went back to 10, when i got CS5 it of course upgraded to 10.1 and so i've since been using firefox without a problem, i even got rid of safari from the dock, i've had safari in the dock for 3 years straight.

 

[mackarone]

The culprit must be safari. I used only firefox and chrome for a week or so, and the glitches never appeared. Now that I'm back to safari, the windows rendering start to misbehave again.

 

[Macula]

Come on, Apple! Solution long overdue!

Black Core2Duo Macbook with X3100 and 4GB of RAM here… Running SL 10.6.3.

All sorts of graphics artifacts have been appearing ever since I installed SL. I have come across all type of issues reported by users so far: Corrupted menu bars, window shadows, colors, dock icons, dashboard widgets, desktops, …

To give a small example, see attached.

At a frequency of 2-3 incidents per day (each requiring a reboot or log off/on cycle), this is beyond ridiculous. It reminds me of the Windows 95 age, for those who are old enough to remember.

To clarify, I have run the Apple Diagnostics (booting from the SL install disc), and all was reported to be clean. This is clearly an OS issue.

 

[mackarone]

Update - maybe not Safari after all

This happened after using Google Chrome for a while. Now I'm really perplexed.

 

[MrCheeto]

Hm, what's your hardware setup? I get these sort of things ONLY when using the Core Image-accelerated effects in Appcleaner on my NONE Core-Image-capable graphics card in my G4. Under "Core Image" it says "Software," so I assume it's simulated in some way...

 

[Macula]

Just one more example

Now these things happen at an unbelievable rate of 1-2 incidents per hour!

Again, this is a C2D Macbook with 4GB of RAM and X3100 graphics.

Shame...

 

[mackarone]

Hm, what's your hardware setup? I get these sort of things ONLY when using the Core Image-accelerated effects in Appcleaner on my NONE Core-Image-capable graphics card in my G4. Under "Core Image" it says "Software," so I assume it's simulated in some way...

I have an intel 2.16 GHz imac core 2 duo with NVIDIA GeForce 7300 GT 128 MB.

 

[djairjr]

Same issue here - Macbook Penryn - Snow Leopard

I have the same problem here. My Macbook Penryn start to do this two or three weeks ago. This issue isn't only related to Safari, but any piece of software. First I think that is hardware, but when I use Ubuntu, the problem don`t appears...

When I read the rumors that apple is creating your own version of flash player, I have the intuition that this issue with display can be something related to Flash.

I uninstall it and the problem is gone.

Try it and see for yourself...

Sorry for bad english...

 

[MrCheeto]

It's odd, but this ONLY happened when I had the 10.1 beta installed on my white MacBook GMA. After I uninstalled, I've had ZERO instances.

 

[mackarone]

Overheating?

I think it also has to do with overheating of the GPU or whatever circuit boards are involved in the graphic processing, at least in the case of my imac, which I transferred to my (chilly) basement a week ago and since then hasn't had a problem.

 

[djairjr]

Uninstall Flash plugin and solve this issue...

I have the same problem here. My Macbook Penryn start to do this two or three weeks ago. This issue isn't only related to Safari, but any piece of software. First I think that is hardware, but when I use Ubuntu, the problem don`t appears...

When I read the rumors that apple is creating your own version of flash player, I have the intuition that this issue with display can be something related to Flash.

I uninstall it and the problem is gone.

Try it and see for yourself...

Sorry for bad english...

 

[MrCheeto]

Um...Apple never helped develop Flash...at all...

 

[fullojellybeans]

never seen the issue before.

try a test user.
try an archive.
try erase.

all this seems to be related to crappy software messing with the graphic drivers for the machine.

someone post console logs from system.log next time it happens. would be interesting to see what it says