So my beloved early 2011 MacBook Pro just radeongated

[badaudio]

Hey guys, Joey here. It seems my computer has died for good.

It started with simply running a specific game (lord of the rings online) in bootcamp followed by a complete graphics crash with a lot of beeps.
I switched it off, powered it back on, and here's the situation:

1. Bootcamp doesn't load (black screen)
2. Mavericks doesn't load
3. Recovery mode goes into blue screen with black lines
4. Internet recovery mode also goes into blue screen with black lines after loading
5. Also the mac partition just now decided to go into blue screen mode too.

I googled these results and came upon the infamous radeongate issue which seems to perfectly describe my computer right now. I bought this early 2011 model in December 2011 so any form of warranty is gone now. Additionally, I never had AppleCare.

What are my options? Am I completely screwed?

It's worth to mention that the game did a similar crash in 2012, but the mac survived. Uninstalled it completely at the time and foolishly attributed it to a possible software issue within the game version itself. I had the same game installed again several times after with no issues.

edit: I had some very important recent files on my mac partition both work and study related which I didn't back up. Understanding that this is a GPU error, the hard disk should be fine. But just to be safe, is there any way/ startup mode of accessing and copying that data to an external HD in this state or is this wishful thinking?

Cheers broskis

 

[simsaladimbamba]

Sorry to hear that, but it is always worth a try to contact Apple with this problem, maybe even try tcook at apple dot com for that, including your serial number (maybe they have some internal program they have not made public to replace some models).

edit: I had some very important recent files on my mac partition both work and study related which I didn't back up. Understanding that this is a GPU error, the hard disk should be fine. But just to be safe, is there any way/ startup mode of accessing and copying that data to an external HD in this state or is this wishful thinking?

If you have any Mac with a Firewire port or have access to one:
Target Disk Mode

If not, just take out the HDD and put it into a USB 3.0 or 2.0 enclosure for 2.5" S-ATA HDDs and connect it to a Mac of your choice or a Windows based computer using MacDrive (7 day trial should suffice for getting your data off onto another medium) or HFSExplorer (free).

 

[badaudio]

Thanks for the reply man. Ill see if I can get ahold of tcook. I'll do the enclosure method ASAP.

I wish I'd have found out about this issue sooner, would have been more cautious and less resource intensive. I couldn't have possibly imagined such defects to be common on such a pricey machine.

 

[alvindarkness]

Thanks for the reply man. Ill see if I can get ahold of tcook. I'll do the enclosure method ASAP.

I wish I'd have found out about this issue sooner, would have been more cautious and less resource intensive. I couldn't have possibly imagined such defects to be common on such a pricey machine.

I had a similar issue happen recently. I managed to get it working again fine with a reflow of the solder under the gpu. But a more permanent and long term solution is to get the gpu re-balled with leaded solder.

There are a few people around who do this service properly (i.e. reball, not just reflow), for under $100 including shipping both ways (in the usa). So it may be an option for you if you want to keep using that laptop long term, and dont want the problem returning.