Users Find Some New MacBook Pros Suffer From Major Graphics Issues

[SteveW928]

I dug up an old post by Marco Arment complaining about dGPU and fan issues on his 2011 15"

Yep, thermal issue have plagued MBPs since at least the early-mid 2000s. While one can do pro work on them, one of my criteria for a pro machine is the ability to run whatever necessary, 24x7, w/o damaging the machine. MBPs have failed in this regard for a long, long time.

I'm finally hoping (what's that thing about doing something again and again, and expecting different results?), that if I go with a base model 13" w base CPU and no dedicated GPU (and adding an eGPU) that my dreams might be realized. I'm guessing with the lower thermal levels of the new CPUs and little added GPU heat, it might be able to finally do it. And, at least if it gets too hot in there, it will probably fail more gracefully than cooking the GPU (as it's integrated, probably with same thermal protection). Also, with SSDs, the storage is probably a bit more heat-robust.

I should probably give up on the dream, and just have two dedicated machines... but, like I said above, I keep trying.

 

[k1121j]

I don't believe it that's what Apple said about my OBS MacBook Pro (15-inch Late 2008) it took me almost 3 years of constant service calls to apple having almost every part replaced two times finally to run out of warrantee. it took a call to customer relations and a lot of my time to finally get the MBP replaced with a screen that did not flicker/overheat/go black... I you have one of these new ones and having graphics problems go up the chain to get it replaced completely with a different product if you can preferably one with out design defect... its not software they told me that for a few years and kept telling e there was an update coming out its a bunch of BS by far that was my worst experience with apple ever.

"
11/1/2011 letter regarding my late 2008 MBP

"We wish to apologize for your recent product problems. We are pleased to have been able to assist by replacing your


(Qty 1) Z0FZ, MBP 15.4/2.4 CTO, Serial Number: W88511821GK ("Original Product") with a (Qty 1) Z0NL: MBP

15.4/BETTER/CTO ("Replacement Product" Late 2011 MBP). You have agreed to return the Original Product to Apple, Inc., within

thirty (30) days of shipment of the Replacement Product. Apple will provide detailed information for the return of the

Original Product after shipment of the Replacement Product."

 

[Rupp]

I'm sitting at my Apple Store with the Radeon equipped 15". I've had the colorful bars problems, erratically, with Calendar & address book. The genius suggested that if I could take a command-shift-3 screenshot that it was likely software, and suggested trying an OS reinstall. So I will. For skeptics, should the problem continue, a return for a new unit was available-at a time convenient to me. Apple Store, and Apple Care are being excellent.

 

[omarmagdi]

Really? What did they told you? They can't reproduce the issue?

https://medium.com/@omarmagdi/macbookproissues-66864794632

There, the whole story!

 

[SteveW928]

It's a laptop, which means design tradeoffs...

Certainly, it can't be a desktop GPU, but it should also be enough to get some xyz job accomplished. I think the big thing about this version of the MBP, is that most pro users will likely use them in a desktop like setup (w/ external monitors) which means they could probably plug a TB3 based eGPU in, and have a desktop level GPU (or two). That wasn't nearly as possibly previously. So, I think I'll avoid this whole AMD dedicated GPU mess and go that route.

 

[itsamacthing]

I dug up an old post by Marco Arment complaining about dGPU and fan issues on his 2011 15"

I remember when I complained about my 2008 burning my lap, and being told it's not a "lap"top at an Apple Store. Oh, don't you remember being able to order a matt display? I guess a focus group told Apple Marketing that general consumers thought that was the only display possible and so they didn't buy an Apple, so Apple went glossy as they moved away from Pro needs and to strictly marketing needs.

 

[Rupp]

This portion of screen is of one window. It occurred post reinstall of OS. Clicking on window returned it to normal. Image below was screen shot before reinstall. Clearly the problem has not been entirely fixed. I'll follow up if other problems occur. I have not tried locating or installing Beta OS.

Edit-afterthought. Am I in the wrong place to discuss the actual problem, its causes, and potential fixes? It seems as if most of the posts are concerned with more general love/hate issues with Apple.

 

[mgauss77]

[doublepost=1480838442][/doublepost]Any 12 year old student volunteering for Apple for free would find these easy to find bugs in one day. This was not a technical oversight but rather a rush to market

The internal views of the iPhone 7plus show it has 5 large chips and 15 small connectors and small pieces. It can be manufactured anywhere, technology has brought a design with little labor component. Now that Trump has lowered the tax burden of large corporations to bring back the profits, they can afford to do that and assemble in the USA.

 

[dollystereo]

My early 2011 have been doing this for a while:

Apple agreed to fix it (before the 31 dec 2016) but I am not sure if they are capable of doing it, any advise?
Also my computer have been randomly shutting down for a while.

 

[whbunn]

13" MBP with Touch Bar. This occurs when awaking from sleep over night

View attachment 676726

Apple Called yesterday (12/7). They expect next OS update will solve my problem.

 

[reyesmac]

Does the iMac have the same GPU issues? Just wondering since if I have to return this laptop for whatever reason I might consider an iMac.

The iMac does not use laptop chips like the Macbook does. As thin as the iMac is, it does have (at least in the last few years) adequate cooling of parts. The newest iMacs do an amazing job of staying cool.

 

[ThisBougieLife]

Thanks for letting me know

I haven't seen any graphics glitches so far while using programs, but I did see "crazy colors" while starting up my Mac this morning. Ugh. Disappointing on a brand new machine. Hope they can fix this.

 

[Rob_2811]

The iMac does not use laptop chips like the Macbook does. As thin as the iMac is, it does have (at least in the last few years) adequate cooling of parts. The newest iMacs do an amazing job of staying cool.

Hmmm..

The 5K iMac ships with AMD Radeon R9 M39, M395 or M395X they are laptop chips. It does handle the thermals better than the MacBook Pro though.

 

[yugioh5d]

I am actually uncertain whether I should buy this MAC or buy the 2015 model....do you think that the graphical issues is a software related not hardware? and will fix in the next update?

 

[SteveW928]

I am actually uncertain whether I should buy this MAC or buy the 2015 model....do you think that the graphical issues is a software related not hardware? and will fix in the next update?

I don't think we know for sure yet.

The big factor for me between the two is the Thunderbolt 3 / USB-C ports, as I'm hoping to expand it externally, especially in terms of GPU. IMO, if you don't care so much about that, you might want to consider the 2015 models. I'm not seeing other huge differences between older ones and this one, besides the touch bar and price.

 

[atbaldwin]

I'm having this same issue. Brand new BTO maxed out MacBook Pro 15" with touch bar. I have the AMD Radeon 460 option. After using the computer for about ten minutes, it will just start glitching out - bright artifacts cover the screen before finally resolving to a solid color. After 5 seconds or so, the computer reboots itself.

I'm also seeing that other glitch when the computer starts up: a band about 1" tall at the bottom of the screen flashes and shows perfectly spaced green vertical bands.

My touch bar is also always dark on startup. This is a pain the ass because I can't up the brightness to see the login window and also can't use Touch ID (since I first have to choose the user I want with the cursor).

Holy crap. What is with the lack of QA at Apple these days???

 

[3568378]

At the same rate and with the current integration your new laptop will last you one third as long before you need to replace the entire assembly in order to achieve a component upgrade.

That might be true if I had gone cheap and bought an Air with 4GB RAM or a 13" with 8. 16 will be plenty sufficient for some time. The jump from 4 to 8 on my previous one yielded far less noticeability than 2 to 4. Also, the first two hard drive upgrades were from platter to platter. In other words, 20+ year old technology to slightly faster 20+ year old technology (first drive was 5400 vs second at 7200). SSD was a HUGE jump, but mine only supported about 1/2 the performance capability of the drive I chose anyway because mine was eSATA or something I think.

 

[Atlantico]

You're trolling, right?

You were being serious? An underclocked 1060 would be lucky to get double the TDP of the Radeon Pro 460. Setting that aside the efficiency of the Radeon chips in general purpose parallel tasks in a generation better than anything Nvidia can offer, see: FCPX on the new MacBook Pros. But no, you want hotter, more power hungry and less efficient GPUs because "nvidia". WTF.

What laptop did you buy?

I left the Mac because I needed a desktop machine. So a while back.

 

[joebayld]

Just started having this issue on log in. It just flashed this when I'm logging in. Fully maxed out 15in MBP with TB. Has anyone seen this? I've been in contact with apple in trying to get this resolved. Looking for insight.

 

[Maurier]

Samsung is behind this ordeal.
Cheeky bastards.

 

[jeyf]

Month old usbC 15" MBP, 2.9 intel processor, 16G ram, 530 graphics, macOS 10.12.1 500G SSD with out FireValt
opened the clam shell and VLc 2.2.4 and a Finder streen were open. I noticed there was graphics distortion attached to the bottom of the Finder screen. Sweet

Could not get the issue to repeat.

I am not running FireVault.

 

[SoyCapitanSoyCapitan]

Just started having this issue on log in. It just flashed this when I'm logging in. Fully maxed out 15in MBP with TB. Has anyone seen this? I've been in contact with apple in trying to get this resolved. Looking for insight.

That's what File Vault does.

 

[bladerunner2000]

You were being serious? An underclocked 1060 would be lucky to get double the TDP of the Radeon Pro 460. Setting that aside the efficiency of the Radeon chips in general purpose parallel tasks in a generation better than anything Nvidia can offer, see: FCPX on the new MacBook Pros. But no, you want hotter, more power hungry and less efficient GPUs because "nvidia". WTF.

LOL, pretty sure you just described how AMD GPUs run, they've never been more efficient than Nvidias. Might wanna get your facts straight.

 

[Atlantico]

LOL, pretty sure you just described how AMD GPUs run, they've never been more efficient than Nvidias. Might wanna get your facts straight.

No I didn't "describe how AMD GPUs run". I only mentioned facts and they're pretty darn straight.

AMD Radeon Pro 460 is running at 35W TDP, way more efficient in computing and does in fact support ascynchronous computing, unlike any NVidia GPU and far more efficient at OpenCL. No Nvidia GPU at 35W is as efficient.

Facts. Straight.

Nvidia 1060 TDP is 120W
Nvidia 1070 TDP is 150W
Nvidia 1080 TDP is 180W

They're like electrical furnaces compared to the Radeon Pro 460 at 35W.

Facts. Straight. The Polaris 11 GPU, which the Radeon Pro 460 is built on, was designed specifically to be an effective, efficient laptop GPU. It's not scaled down for that purpose. It's designed for that purpose. The leafblowing 10xx series from nvidia is a desktop GPU.

And you're actually whining about the lack of one of these leafblowers in the new thin and light MacBook Pro, you know the one with limited battery life, questionable heat spreading and a super low power CPU/RAM.

Reality doesn't much intrude in the life of the nvidiot. Whatever nvidia poops out must be moar powah efficient, and totes lol better than Ati. Lulz.

 

[sziehr]

No I didn't "describe how AMD GPUs run". I only mentioned facts and they're pretty darn straight.

AMD Radeon Pro 460 is running at 35W TDP, way more efficient in computing and does in fact support ascynchronous computing, unlike any NVidia GPU and far more efficient at OpenCL. No Nvidia GPU at 35W is as efficient.

Facts. Straight.

Nvidia 1060 TDP is 120W
Nvidia 1070 TDP is 150W
Nvidia 1080 TDP is 180W

They're like electrical furnaces compared to the Radeon Pro 460 at 35W.

Facts. Straight. The Polaris 11 GPU, which the Radeon Pro 460 is built on, was designed specifically to be an effective, efficient laptop GPU. It's not scaled down for that purpose. It's designed for that purpose. The leafblowing 10xx series from nvidia is a desktop GPU.

And you're actually whining about the lack of one of these leafblowers in the new thin and light MacBook Pro, you know the one with limited battery life, questionable heat spreading and a super low power CPU/RAM.

Reality doesn't much intrude in the life of the nvidiot. Whatever nvidia poops out must be moar powah efficient, and totes lol better than Ati. Lulz.

Fact Adobe refuses to optimize for AMD vs Nvidia furnace cards. Thus every one you meet will tell you just how poor a choice the AMD card was for apple to make. The users will not turn on there adobe masters and demand that they optomize for AMD. They just cry about how poor a choice apple made. They do not know about TDM or efficiency and they don't care cause they want the adobe thing to work better year over year with no effort from adobe.