Urgent - Has Starcraft 2 fried my iMac GPU?

[skyrick]

@BRLayer,

I'm happy for you !

So, it's must be SC2 in my case too
(I bought it at the end of july and have trouble at the beginning of August)

My iMac is actually in a Apple Center, they test it and call me back at the beginning of the next week to tell we what happened and what can I do.
I hope so much than Apple France is also commercial that your Apple Switzerland because my iMac is out of warranty too
Did you have Apple by phone or by a Apple receler or a Apple center ?

 

[gregorsamsa]

Tks all for your feedback; I really appreciate it..!

I actually have some good news to report; even without acknowledging full responsibility, Apple has agreed to fix my iMac for free (as it's out of warranty) through a MOBO and GPU replacement. This is why I love Apple - its service is second to none!

But in fact, it seems like both NVIDIA and Blizzard are to blame here. The former for devising unreliable cards, and the latter for releasing its games with such a bad coding that revs up GPUs to the point of no return...

I also got an explanation from Apple that SC2's problem is seemingly that each AND every game unit is rendered individually with no frame limiters, something that is most probably taxing the card in the same way as if you kept your own car at a constant red line speed...no graphics card is able to survive that long unless it's perfectly cooled and operated under perfect power conditions (no power surges)...

Besides, Blizzard has ALREADY issued a manual code "fix" to limit menu frame rates. This means that they DO acknowledge a problem, even if skeptics continue saying that a game cannot per se affect GPUs...and the 8800gs is close enough to those other g92 and g94 types of gpus.

Bottom line:

- badly coded software can lead to hardware failure, or at least accelerate it;

- a closed design may help in causing such disruptions if operating conditions are not optimal;

- NVIDIA GPUs are not seeing their best days.

You may also check MacFixIt's article about it...it's definitely an issue worth investigating.

I don't have the game, yet, & it's the first I've heard of this type of thing happening with a Mac game, but good on Apple for giving you a free fix when you're out of warranty. Really top notch customer service!

 

[pr5owner]

well software cannot "FRY" your hardware, it can only make your processors work at 100% (which it should do anyways with no problems for an infinite amount of time) computers if designed properly can operate a 100% indefinitely, it should never reach thermal shutdown temperatures, servers operate like this all the time for YEARS.

my computer even overclocked to 4GHz and my dual gTX470s run at MAXIMUM when i play games at the highest settings, and ive played for sometimes 16hours almost straight (the computer is almost 2.5 years old now), your computer should NEVER have a problem running at MAX, its the reason why they have fans and heatsinks,

now due to the design of apple products being slim and all, they dont have nearly enough ventilation nor do they use the proper cooling methods from what ive seen

also it was a well known fact that apple ordered defective products from both ATI and nVidia and refused to acknowledge the problem until MUCH later (pretty much too late)

if you are artifact, your gpu is dead or the video ram is dead

its not blizzards fault, its Apple's fault, they should replace your video card as it is defective (and probably part of a class action lawsuit, see other threads in this forum about the MBP and MacPro defective cards)

I also got an explanation from Apple that SC2's problem is seemingly that each AND every game unit is rendered individually with no frame limiters, something that is most probably taxing the card in the same way as if you kept your own car at a constant red line speed...no graphics card is able to survive that long unless it's perfectly cooled and operated under perfect power conditions (no power surges)...

this couldn't possibly be true, most high end graphics cards take up DUAL slots, 1 for the card, 1 for the cooler, they are designed to be ran at maximum, comparing it to a car does not make sense, there are moving parts in a car, its a mechanical object. if your analogy is true than all those folding at home setups would have exploded by now, some of them have been running for YEARS at maximum with a stock cooler. im thinking in this scenario apple cheaped out on the copper heat sinks to make the computer slimer

 

[wyrmintheapple]

Bottom line:

- badly coded software can lead to hardware failure, or at least accelerate it;

- a closed design may help in causing such disruptions if operating conditions are not optimal;

- NVIDIA GPUs are not seeing their best days.

OK, I feel compelled to say something. Your second two points are perfectly correct, however the first is simply not true.

Bottom Line: A game is supposed to run as fast as possible, making as good use of the hardware as is possible. Faster hardware, faster game. It is the job of the hardware and associated drivers to make sure the card is used properly and ultimately the cards own thermal management systems to ensure it doesn't overheat. Possibly the drivers or more likely the card has failed you, but as others have said it is nothing and I mean NOTHING to do with blizzard. Starcraft 2 is demanding, yes, but ultimately the card should not run itself to death.

 

[50548]

OK, I feel compelled to say something. Your second two points are perfectly correct, however the first is simply not true.

Bottom Line: A game is supposed to run as fast as possible, making as good use of the hardware as is possible. Faster hardware, faster game. It is the job of the hardware and associated drivers to make sure the card is used properly and ultimately the cards own thermal management systems to ensure it doesn't overheat. Possibly the drivers or more likely the card has failed you, but as others have said it is nothing and I mean NOTHING to do with blizzard. Starcraft 2 is demanding, yes, but ultimately the card should not run itself to death.

I agree with you in principle, but it's also true that companies should strive their best to avoid overtaxing gpus to the point of almost destroying them. My case is not unique; Blizzard has ALREADY issued a fix to stop excessive rendering; if what you said were completely true, they wouldn't have released it. I am talking here about SEVERAL cases of PCs and Macs suffering from excessive resource utilization when playing SC2, which then leads to hardware failure - remember, few computers operate in optimal power and ventilation conditions. If there was no such link between coding and hardware, my computer would've already fried a long time ago from playing CoD4 in max settings for hours and hours...

I take your point, but still think that some nexus of causality IS there.

 

[benthewraith]

I am gonna need some assistance here, as it seems like SC2 has absolutely fried my video card. I am talking here of my Intel iMac 2.8 C2D, nvidia 8800gs, 4gb of Ram.

Whenever I try to boot it up now, it either goes into an endless bong loop or shows screen artifacts. This has never happened before, but only after playing SC2...i was still able to check some crash reports that mentioned nvidia as the main cause, so I am pretty sure this is about sc2's uncapped frame rates affecting the gpu.

I would GLADLY welcome any assistance or advice, as I can't even start up my computer anymore...and I repeat: this has only occurred after playing sc2 a couple of times (both times leading to a hard crash and artifacts).

Thanks in advance!

Sent from my iPad

That card was recalled along with the Nvidia Geforce 8600m iirc. Something about the metallic conductor being deformed. Apple has extended the warranty to all computers using those nvidia chipsets (in regards to the GPU and any other damages caused by the defective GPU).

 

[goMac]

I agree with you in principle, but it's also true that companies should strive their best to avoid overtaxing gpus to the point of almost destroying them. My case is not unique; Blizzard has ALREADY issued a fix to stop excessive rendering; if what you said were completely true, they wouldn't have released it. I am talking here about SEVERAL cases of PCs and Macs suffering from excessive resource utilization when playing SC2, which then leads to hardware failure - remember, few computers operate in optimal power and ventilation conditions. If there was no such link between coding and hardware, my computer would've already fried a long time ago from playing CoD4 in max settings for hours and hours...

I take your point, but still think that some nexus of causality IS there.

The 8800 series was known to be defective with JUST this issue. Happens in ANY game, not just SC2.

There is a class action lawsuit against NVidia just for this reason actually. I already lost one Mac Pro 8800 GT before SC2 even came out for just this issue.

Game developers can't code around defective hardware. It's not Blizzard's fault. It's Apple/NVidia.

 

[Corruptitudes]

I dont buy into your idea of software destroying your gpu.

I have the exact same machine, with the 8800gs. And my 1st gpu fried at the end of august. I drove 1200 miles round trip to drop it off at an apple store because they told me they wouldnt ship the 24" Imac. So about a week later, I got my machine back.

I played Civ 4 one time 2 days later. After that, it fried my gpu again. Yes, two days later. So now I can say a 5 year old game fried my gpu, or more likely the culprit the 8800gs is just a crappy card.

Apple has now sent out a tech to my house, which he replaced the motherboard, as well as the graphics card. Now my fans run constantly, and never shut off. Apple is still working on a resolution, and is thinking about sending another tech to my location to get it fixed...

Its not the software...trust me....

 

[50548]

I dont buy into your idea of software destroying your gpu.

I have the exact same machine, with the 8800gs. And my 1st gpu fried at the end of august. I drove 1200 miles round trip to drop it off at an apple store because they told me they wouldnt ship the 24" Imac. So about a week later, I got my machine back.

I played Civ 4 one time 2 days later. After that, it fried my gpu again. Yes, two days later. So now I can say a 5 year old game fried my gpu, or more likely the culprit the 8800gs is just a crappy card.

Apple has now sent out a tech to my house, which he replaced the motherboard, as well as the graphics card. Now my fans run constantly, and never shut off. Apple is still working on a resolution, and is thinking about sending another tech to my location to get it fixed...

Its not the software...trust me....

Anyways, I would like to thank everybody for their feedback and remarks...I've just arrived from the Apple Store (after some 3 days for the repair) and my wonderful iMac seems to be working great; they didn't even touch my HD, so all files are in place!

Thank you for an excellent (and free) service, Apple!

 

[Wyldechild]

Got liquid cooling in my hackintosh/PC case.

Overheating issues? What's that?

 

[50548]

That card was recalled along with the Nvidia Geforce 8600m iirc. Something about the metallic conductor being deformed. Apple has extended the warranty to all computers using those nvidia chipsets (in regards to the GPU and any other damages caused by the defective GPU).

I stand corrected about my previous remarks on SC2...the 8800GS/G92 GPU IS THE CULPRIT, no doubt about it.

I have BAD news to report again, just when I thought everything was fine...after using my newly-fixed iMac for a few hours (when everything seemed to be ok), I fired up CoD4 (a game I used to play all the time), JUST to find out that the GPU is busted AGAIN..!

It hasn't yet come to the point where the iMac can't start at all, so I am right now using FW target disk mode to backup some files...by itself it doesn't start anymore (it just gets stuck with multiple artifacts), so I will have to take it AGAIN to the Apple Store; but this time I will ask for a refurb or new unit NOT affected by that NVIDIA crap...I hope Apple continues to provide a top-notch service, because this is UNBEARABLE...

 

[Cougarcat]

BRLawyer, my advice to you is go to the top. I emailed sjobs@apple.com with my PowerBook issues, and a high-level person from Apple called me the next day. These are the people who have the power to get you a new machine.

 

[neoelectronaut]

I am gonna need some assistance here, as it seems like SC2 has absolutely fried my video card. I am talking here of my Intel iMac 2.8 C2D, nvidia 8800gs, 4gb of Ram.

Whenever I try to boot it up now, it either goes into an endless bong loop or shows screen artifacts. This has never happened before, but only after playing SC2...i was still able to check some crash reports that mentioned nvidia as the main cause, so I am pretty sure this is about sc2's uncapped frame rates affecting the gpu.

I would GLADLY welcome any assistance or advice, as I can't even start up my computer anymore...and I repeat: this has only occurred after playing sc2 a couple of times (both times leading to a hard crash and artifacts).

Thanks in advance!

Sent from my iPad

Does it look like this?

Edit: This is what my 3.06Ghz 24" iMac w/ 8800gs did to me a few months back. Luckily I was still under my 3-year Applecare and after a few weeks of attempted repair Apple just replaced the whole damn thing with a brand spankin' new 27-incher.

Which reminds me I need to buy Applecare on my new one before the year's out.

 

[50548]

Does it look like this?

http://img707.imageshack.us/img707/1651/img1823s.jpg

Edit: This is what my 3.06Ghz 24" iMac w/ 8800gs did to me a few months back. Luckily I was still under my 3-year Applecare and after a few weeks of attempted repair Apple just replaced the whole damn thing with a brand spankin' new 27-incher.

Which reminds me I need to buy Applecare on my new one before the year's out.

Exactly like that, but can get worse with vertical columns on a dark background...they fixed mine for free out of warranty, but now I will definitely ask for a refurb or new unit...this is unfixable in my view.

 

[50548]

I took it back to the Apple Store, where I was able to replicate the problem...they apologized and said they're gonna escalate the issue with engineering; I simply said I don't want another NVIDIA crap inside my Mac...hopefully They will understand my issue and at least get me a refurb; will keep you posted anyway.

 

[Corruptitudes]

Does it look like this?

Edit: This is what my 3.06Ghz 24" iMac w/ 8800gs did to me a few months back. Luckily I was still under my 3-year Applecare and after a few weeks of attempted repair Apple just replaced the whole damn thing with a brand spankin' new 27-incher.

Which reminds me I need to buy Applecare on my new one before the year's out.

How did you get a new one? My 2.8ghz 24 inch 8800gs failed, got it replaced under applecare, then 2 days later failed again. They sent out a tech to my location, which got it fixed, but now my fans constantly run. Apple is now sending out another tech to get it fixed yet again.

At this point I really want a newer machine, but I dont think I should have to fork out the money for one, and want this machine replaced but the tech I keep talking to doesnt seem to be bothered about me driving 1200 miles the first time to get my machine fixed, only to have it happen again, and then after that one got fixed the fans run crazy. He thinks the motherboard needs to be replaced again....

 

[neoelectronaut]

How did you get a new one? My 2.8ghz 24 inch 8800gs failed, got it replaced under applecare, then 2 days later failed again. They sent out a tech to my location, which got it fixed, but now my fans constantly run. Apple is now sending out another tech to get it fixed yet again.

At this point I really want a newer machine, but I dont think I should have to fork out the money for one, and want this machine replaced but the tech I keep talking to doesnt seem to be bothered about me driving 1200 miles the first time to get my machine fixed, only to have it happen again, and then after that one got fixed the fans run crazy. He thinks the motherboard needs to be replaced again....

Well I dropped it off at my local Apple Store to get repaired as I was still covered under Applecare.

They had it over three weeks, and after multiple calls from techs with updates, finally one called me and basically said "Okay so you can wait it out until we get a part for the thing, or you can just come pick up a new one."

Well hells yes ma'am, I'll take a new one.

 

[50548]

Well, this is just to inform you that I finally took my fixed iMac (for free) from the Apple Store...this time they've replaced both the GPU and the MOBO.

So far, so good, but no testing with 3D games yet. I told them I will return in case the fix doesn't really suffice. I promise to keep you posted anyway..!

 

[zerstmon]

Great thread, saved me a bundle

Great thread guys. I ran into this same issue after running Starcraft 2. Fried the video card and the system would only run about 10 minutes before having to be shut down for hours so it could cool off.

I found this thread and received hope. I too *had* the 2008 series iMac, 3.06 with the 8800 series graphics card.

I called Apple Support, walked the tech through all the troubleshooting procedures I had run against the system. He told me to take it to my nearest Apple Store. That would be Salt Lake which is an 8 hour round trip for me. We have a local Apple Authorized Repair Station here in Rexburg but I wanted the Apple monkeys to put eyes on it instead. With hopes the retail store would have more say in a repair for an out of warranty system.

My system was out of warranty as I did not purchase the AppleCare package within the first year.

I showed up at the scheduled Apple Store Genius Bar time and immediately the tech asked if it were under warranty and then grimaced when I said it was not. I told him of the issues related to the Video card and the problems with SC2 in general running on iMacs, I also asked if there was a recall on the video card.

He said there was not an official recall on the video card, but the card was reporting as bad in my system. He said Apple would replace it free of charge and he needed a manager to just ok the transaction. No other questions were asked or needed.

The tech wrote up the paperwork and ordered the part from the main warehouse. He said it would be 3 to 5 business days and we could pick it up. I believe the original paperwork showed the cost of the card at $431.00 or something close to that. He also said Apple was updating these cards with a Rev B. card that didn't succumb to the same heating issues as the original card.

So headed back to Rexburg for the week. Dropped in the following weekend to pick up the iMac and they had it all ready. Signed off on all the paperwork and decided to check out the cosmetic condition of the machine prior to leaving the store. Boy oh boy am I glad I did that. After taking off Apple's protective foam wrapping I first noticed a slight ding in the Aluminum front panel just right of the Apple Logo. Then I noticed a huge gouge out of the back of the iMac in the upper left corner. It was about a 4 inch gash.

I simply asked the sales rep handling the queuing of the Genius bar to come take a look at it. He looked it over, looked at the paperwork that indicated there were zero external marks or blemishes and swiped up the mac and headed for the back room. He said they would take care of the issue.

A few minutes later he returned and apologized profusely for the damage to my iMac and said Apple takes these things very seriously. He then proceeded to swap my 2008 24" 3.06 out with a new 27".

Apple ran the data transfer for me so I didn't have to do a thing except take it home and drool all over it.

Love them or hate them, you have to admit they sure know how to take care of the customer. I didn't ask for a new machine and at first I really wanted to take my old machine back, I just wanted the cosmetics fixed. But after talking to the sales rep about the differences in the machines I decided to go with the new one.

Thanks again Apple!

All in all Apple may not advertise issues with the 8800 series video card but they sure didn't hesitate in replacing the video card for free once I showed up at the Apple Store.

I hope others with this issue find this same thread as I have. I sure thought I was hosed when it first died on me.

Zerst