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Portables (Apple) Hardware Apple

GPUs Dropping Dead In 2011 MacBook Pro Models 359

New submitter blackwizard writes "MacRumors is reporting on pervasive GPU failures in 2011 MacBook Pro machines, leading both to intermittent video issues, corruption, crashing/freezing, and eventually even failure to boot. Luckily for Apple, the machines are now out of warranty (unless you bought AppleCare). The issues have been reported both on Apple's own forums and other blogs. Apple has so far failed to take action on the problem. Will they take ownership of the issue, or continue to ask customers to pay for an entire new logic board when just the GPU fails?"
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GPUs Dropping Dead In 2011 MacBook Pro Models

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  • by dmiller1984 ( 705720 ) on Saturday January 18, 2014 @11:40AM (#45998849)
    If it's truly faulty hardware Apple will typically own up to it and offer repairs free of charge. I have the 2008 MBP that had a logic board issue and Apple replaced it for free even though I was well past the warranty and didn't have AppleCare.
    • by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 18, 2014 @11:47AM (#45998899)

      Bullshit, Apple will do no such thing unless they face severe penalties. Here in Denmark it took several court cases regarding faulty design on the MBP, which Apple lost all of them - even then did Apple not want to own up and repair the affected MBPs, it wasn't until they faced severe repercussions they started fixing them.

      By the way, I'm a happy MBP owner and will probably keep being one, just saying, don't expect them to go out of the way to help you.

      • by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 18, 2014 @11:58AM (#45998989)

        A laptop built by my company has serious issues with GPUs dropping ead. Now, should we initiate a recall? Take the number of laptops in the field, A, multiply by the probable rate of failure, B, multiply by the average out-of-court settlement, C. A times B times C equals X. If X is less than the cost of a recall, we don't do one.

        • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

          That's the Ford Pinto memo [calbaptist.edu], eh? I doubt if anybody is going to leak Apple's modern equivalent.

          Not that anybody is gonna die like with the Pinto, but the pangs of Mac withdrawal could be debilitating.

          • by jd2112 ( 1535857 )
            The Pinto Memo was famously quoted in 'Fight Club' which is what I believe the AC is referencing here.
        • by amiga3D ( 567632 )

          That's good for bean counters that run most corporations these days. Eventually though you lose brand loyalty if you keep fucking your customers over. When that happens you become just another nothing special outfit. Apple can't afford that. If they lose the association of quality with their name they'll die.

      • by Just Some Guy ( 3352 ) <kirk+slashdot@strauser.com> on Saturday January 18, 2014 @12:49PM (#45999319) Homepage Journal

        That's not true. I bought a used, out-of-warranty iMac which developed bad capacitors (swollen and leaking) on the graphics card a year later. I called Apple and they replaced everything inside it without charging me a penny. I never heard of that being a big scandal, and in the US I doubt they had any legal obligations to fix my 3.5 year old used Mac.

        I think a more accurate version is that sometimes Apple fixes things for free because they want to, and other times because they're forced to. There's no obvious way of knowing in advance which way an "event" will go.

        • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 ) *

          It's basically luck if they happen to acknowledge your particular fault, in which case as you say they will usually fix it. If they don't though... Like the manufacturing defects in iMac screens [youtube.com], for example.

          Faulty moisture sensors was the other classic one. Took a lawsuit to sort that out. On the other hand they admitted the iPhone 4 antenna problem fairly quickly and gave everyone rubber bumpers. Who knows how they decide what to fix and what to pretend doesn't exist.

    • by chmodman ( 565242 ) on Saturday January 18, 2014 @12:11PM (#45999077)
      I have this model MBP, and yes, it failed exactly as described. I think the problem is made worse when paired with the thunderbolt screen, which forces the dedicated GPU to be used instead of the Intel GPU. It runs super HOT all the time, even when simply web browsing. Many have found a utility called smcFanControl to force the fan to run at full speed at all times in an attempt to compensate for a bad design. There are numerous YouTube video's of how to "cook" the logic board in an oven for 3 min @ 375 deg to reflow the solder and I found this does fix it temporarily, so its definitely a solder ball issue. Ultimately, I found a repair service on e-bay that for $150, replaces the solder balls on the BGA with lead balls (supposedly) and this is a more permanent fix. According to him (and he seems legit) the lead-free BGA balls suck, and over time fail with extended heat / use. I hope there is a class action on this one, because I paid almost $3k for this laptop and it only lasted 2 years!
      • Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)

        by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Saturday January 18, 2014 @01:01PM (#45999389)
        Comment removed based on user account deletion
        • This is an industry wide issue thanks to RoHS.

          Yep, and the thermal profile of a laptop (and a thin one at that) makes it that much more of a difficult environment.

          I wonder when or if we've seen the first deaths from RoHS - in safety-critical systems in healthcare or potentially dangerous environments. Lead is akin to kryptonite in the anti-DHMO circles that run government bureaucracies.

          Remember, kids, GPU's are chips but you shouldn't put them in your mouth.

          • by dgatwood ( 11270 )

            We've almost certainly seen deaths. Some models of vehicles have frequent ABS module failures because of solder joints failing, even in the U.S., where RoHS doesn't apply. With lead-free solder, I'd expect those problems to be much more frequent, and every ABS unit that isn't working increases the odds of somebody being unable to avoid a car accident.

            Mind you, chances are good that none of those deaths have been properly reported as being caused by RoHS, because the odds against someone noticing somethin

            • by xaxa ( 988988 )

              because the odds against someone noticing something as subtle as a defective ABS module during a post-crash investigation are astronomical.

              Compare the effort that goes into investigating a rail accident (example [raib.gov.uk] -- a derailment with no injuries, a 41-page report concluding with learning points and recommendations) to the not-much that happens after a road accident.

              I'd like to see more effort spent investigating road accidents -- perhaps choosing a small sample to thoroughly investigate.

            • by amorsen ( 7485 )

              I can guarantee that a non-working ABS would be detected in very close to 100% of investigations of deadly accidents in Denmark. Whether they would be detected during the stupid mandatory car check done every two years I am not sure.

              Alas, practically no fatalities in Denmark are due to faults with the cars, at least not faults which makes the car illegal to drive (like broken ABS), and Denmark is a bit infamous for the average age of its vehicles.

            • So don't drive your car when the ABS warning light is on.
              It's one of the systems that goes through a full self-test every time it turns on.

            • Those failures were on Bosch anti-lock units. The failure was caused by ultrasonic joint going bad. The fix is to replace the joints with solder. I had it done to my failed unit and it has worked perfectly ever since.
            • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 ) *

              The question is would more people have died from lead and other hazardous substance pollution than have died because of defective solder joints? Can defective soldering even be blamed on RoHS, when slightly more expensive but much more reliable lead free solder is available to those who choose to pay for it?

          • This sounds to my [admittedly uneducated] ears just like the yellow light of death issues affecting the PS3, particularly the launch models. Same issue, more or less; the PS3 gets cooked when the lead-free solder cracks and allows the GPU to physically separate from the board.

            [I am sad, I have a launch model that's been taken in twice for reflowing; it's now failed a third time, so no more]

            I did have a 2011 mbp as well, but a 13" without the discrete graphics that I've since passed to my girlfriend. I recko

            • I've had satellite receivers crap out and I've had to heat-gun the chips back into connection. It's a real great way to generate mountains of e-waste - most people don't put a heat gun to their electronics' motherboards.

              RoHS was supposed to be about e-waste, but maybe they forgot about unintended consequences.

        • by v1 ( 525388 ) on Saturday January 18, 2014 @01:57PM (#45999767) Homepage Journal

          In the case of the 2008 and the 2.2/2.4 mbp's, the problem was actually Nvidia, fault, not Apple.. Apple pushes the design limits of their components pretty close to the edge to keep their designs small, light, and enduring. The frame and cooling was designed to only slightly exceed required cooling for nvidia's GPU, according to their provided specifications.

          Nvidia lied about the cooling requirements of their GPU, describing it as requiring less cooling than it actually did. (probably as a selling point to get Apple to use it) As a result, the machine didn't adequately cool it under very high stress. (playing WoW for an extended time was a known cause of failure) As a result, boards and GPUs flexed, ball solder joints failed, and gpus stopped functioning. (this is not a gpu defect or a ball problem, it's a mechanical problem, caused by thermal stress due to inadequate cooling)

          After Apple had encountered a larger number of in-warranty failures than expected, they contacted Nvidia, who denied the problem. Bad logic boards continued to pour in and get repaired under the one year warranty, but replaced boards were frequently failing again, and users were sometimes seeing 2-4 replacements within the first year. A few customers got a new machine per Apple's policy on "three major repairs within warranty", some of which had gpu failures on their replacement machines as well. Apple put their own engineers to work testing new GPUs, and found that the cooling requirements were significantly above Nvidia's stated specs.

          Although they were aware of this issue well before the first year, Apple's SOP on an issue like this is to stay quiet until the units start dropping out of their first year's warranty, and then issue a Repair Extension on them. (probably trying to mitigate a drop in sales on a "defective model") Coverage time for REPs vary, and only extend the warranty on the specific part, and only for the specific failure. REPs typically extend coverage to the 2, 3, or 4 year point after purchase. It does not stack with applecare extended warranty. This REP I believe went the maximum at four years from date of purchase.

          Apple has issued a dozen or so REPs in the last ten years. Considering the units sold, the variety of models offered, and the cutting-edge technology they'r fond of using, this is actually a pretty low failure rate, as well as a very good manufacturer's response.

          2011 is not a new computer, it's going on three years old. Referring to them as "dropping dead" makes it sound like it's a very early failure (first year or so) I think the article is being sensational and a bit deceptive to link-bait. Apple expects their products to last 3-5 years before they get replaced. Considering how fast tech advances, and that Apple users typically want new and cutting-edge tech, this isn't at all unreasonable. With as many models as they make, there are going to be those that fail sooner than others, and that you can expect to get less than 7-8 years out of. This may just be one of them. It happens. And it can suck to be the unlucky one that owns one. But "only" getting three years out of a laptop may not be desirable, but it's hardly a travesty. If Apple were to refuse to cover failures inside the one year warranty, or not extend coverage to units failing frequently in the 2-3 year area, that'd be newsworthy. This really isn't.

          • by sjames ( 1099 ) on Saturday January 18, 2014 @02:27PM (#45999961) Homepage Journal

            3 years IS an early death. Even my ten year old white box specials still run just as well as they ever did. It's reasonable to expect more from a premium brand.

            • by tmosley ( 996283 )
              Yup. I buy Macs for their longevity. If they stopped working after three years, you might as well buy a PC for far less and get the same lifespan.
          • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

            Stopped reading after the first paragraph. Since it is Apple that does the system design and manufacturing, it is entirely their responsibility to make sure the design works. If the nVidia part fails to work within their design requirements, they should be selecting a different part.

          • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

            by AmiMoJo ( 196126 ) *

            Nvidia lied about the cooling requirements of their GPU, describing it as requiring less cooling than it actually did.

            This is not true. Nvidia simply did not test their hardware through enough thermal cycles to discover that the soldering would fail after some time, typically 12-18 months. No malice, just incompetence. You probably got the impression that they lied because a common fix, suggested by themselves, was to underclock the GPU or increase cooling, but that was simply an attempt to reduce thermal cycling load and get the parts past the mandatory 2 year EU warranty.

            Apple put their own engineers to work testing new GPUs, and found that the cooling requirements were significantly above Nvidia's stated specs.

            Seems like an incredible waste of time considering

        • This is an industry wide issue thanks to RoHS. This isn't just Apple, this effects Dell and HP laptops that have high temp GPUs. The XBox 360 is another perfect example. The problem is caused from the constant thermal cycling causing expansion and contraction as it cools. Like bending a paper clip, over time metal fatigue sets in and cracks the solder.

          AFAIK, they still use tin-lead based solder in medical equipment, even the new stuff, for this reason. The consumer industry went along with the RoHS stuff because they knew it was a form of built-in obsolescence. Even the tin whisker problem has been known about since the 1960s.

          • With tin, you get whiskers. With lead, you get the solder pushed out of the way by thermal cycling. Is there any winning?

      • Why do you people keep buying laptops with tiny cooling systems and dedicated graphics cards with dozens of Watts of TDP? I stopped buying those damned things years ago and haven't had to replace a machine since then.

        Reliable onboard Intel graphics > Hot-headed dedicated graphics

        Graphically intensive work (and gaming) should be done on desktops.

    • by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 18, 2014 @12:14PM (#45999087)

      Shit, I'm getting really worried now. I've got a 2011 MacBook Pro and I do so much Ruby on Rails and JavaScript. I wake up at 4 am every day and then I put on my fedora, my anime t-shirt and I write Ruby on Rails and JavaScript libraries until 3 am the next day. Sometimes I don't even eat and urinate, but that's beside the point.

      Could all my hardcore Rubying be causing my MacBook Pro to die? I do push it pretty hard. A lot of the coding I'm doing is webscale. I even use NoSQL I'm dealing with so much data. My web app's logging subsystem logs almost 2 GB of data a month. When you're dealing with a lot of data like that a superpowerful database like Mongo then I can understand my poor little MacBook having a hard time coping. Maybe I'm pushing her too hard?

      I can't just ease up though. I've got so many Ruby on Rails web apps to write and so many JavaScript libraries to craft. This is a life or death situation for me. I don't want it to be a life or death situation for my MacBook either. We've been through so much! I remember writing my very first line of code ever on my laptop. It was a Ruby code and it made me feel really good. Now I'm an accomplished software architect with numerous Web 2.0 web sites under my belt like for the local veterinarian and the herbal store down the street.

      Now I really don't know what to do. I'm so confused. I want my MacBook to live forever because it has become part of me. But I need to use her, too. I need her to do my Ruby on Rails coding and my JavaScript programming. I need to use my NoSQL DB but if it hurts my MacBook Pro, do I really want to use it? I just don't know any more.

    • > If it's truly faulty hardware Apple will typically own up to it and offer repairs free of charge.

      You missed one important bit.

      Applies only in the US. Fuck elsewhere we do not care about you.

      • by TheRaven64 ( 641858 ) on Saturday January 18, 2014 @12:47PM (#45999311) Journal
        I've seen the opposite. In the UK, if you quote the Sale of Goods Act when you call them up, they'll quickly replace faulty parts 4 years after the original purchase. In the US, as soon as the warranty expires, you're fucked if anything goes wrong.
    • No they don't. I had Power Mac G5, 3Ghz. I got it as soon as it came out. It was liquid cooled. I never put serious load on this system, I used it as a workstation but rarely was it ever running at 100% CPU usage. One day I noticed it shut off and wouldn't turn back on. Turns out the coolant had leaked out over the logic board, frying it. I had paid $3500 for the setup, it was 2 years old. Did some research and apparently the o-rings in the first few runs were known to be defective, and they silently switch

    • Comment removed based on user account deletion
      • Don't get me started on that "Green" solder. That stuff causes so many failures it isn't even funny. The old box camera CCTV security cameras that were made before "green"solder was used would often last over a decade. There are some B&W cameras at one facility still in service that have manufacture dates on them from 1993 when the facility first opened, 20 years of trouble free operation. Only reason I was in the housing for those cameras was to clean the lenses and re-focus.

        The newer stuff? Some sp
  • by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 18, 2014 @11:43AM (#45998867)

    Thankfully, I was there to tell them "I told you so."

  • by Anonymous Coward

    MacBooks are mostly used for appearance. Surely, the hipsters can go to a coffee shop with one that doesn't have a working GPU.

  • History (Score:4, Informative)

    by Sponge Bath ( 413667 ) on Saturday January 18, 2014 @11:53AM (#45998945)

    Apple has shown they will replace whatever is necessary, if there is a defect. When the Nvidia 8400M chip was defective (material in chip package caused solder ball fracture due to thermal expansion), they replaced main boards. Dell used the same chip in XPS laptops (I had one and it did die), and supplied the same fix. Of course, in that instance they got some reimbursement from Nvidia.

    Smart corporations know to do the right thing or take a righteous bitch slapping from consumers and lawyers.

    • Correction: 8600M
    • Re:History (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Mark4ST ( 249650 ) on Saturday January 18, 2014 @12:59PM (#45999369) Homepage
      The problem is that Quanta (they build system boards for Apple's laptop division) has never been able to properly do a ball grid array. The problem is not the chips or cooling, it's the "good enough" techniques Quanta uses to attach them to to a system board. If a ball grid array is done properly, it can be quite robust-- Quanta doesn't seem to care about longevity of the product, and hasn't for a number of years.

      Quanta's quality problems are even more dire when you see that they manufacture about one third of the world's laptop system boards.

      Please see Quanta [wikipedia.org] and ball grid array [wikipedia.org].

      • The problem is not the chips or cooling, it's the "good enough" techniques Quanta uses to attach them to to a system board.

        The case I described had a detailed investigation by Nvidia, who claimed responsibility and reported the materials problem in the chip package. They payed hundreds of millions to settle. The chip in question was used by multiple vendors, all of which had the same failures.

        Given those facts, it is hard to see how you come to the conclusion Apple/Quanta is responsible.

  • Score: -1, Flamebait (Score:4, Informative)

    by danaris ( 525051 ) <danaris@mac . c om> on Saturday January 18, 2014 @11:55AM (#45998967) Homepage

    "Will they take ownership of the issue, or continue to ask customers to pay for an entire new logic board when just the GPU fails?"

    Seriously?

    Apple has a history of acknowledging and providing free fixes for issues of this magnitude, if they're really affecting a significant percentage of the population. I've been the beneficiary of such a fix in the past myself.

    Hell, that's even mentioned in the linked article:

    Mid–2011 iMacs with AMD Radeon HD 6970 graphics cards experienced similar failures and in August of 2013, Apple initiated a Graphics Card Replacement Program [macrumors.com] for the computers, replacing the graphics cards of affected iMacs at no cost.

    So with the MacRumors article having only come out yesterday, it seems pretty aggressively snide to be suggesting that Apple's going to ignore the issue.

    Dan Aris

    • For the 2011 macbook pros, my guess is that this mostly impacts the AMD Radeon HD 6750M and AMD Radeon HD 6770M.

      I would imagine the AMD Radeon HD 6490M doesn't get hot enough to be impacted :)

    • by ssimpson ( 133662 ) <slashdot@samsimps o n . c om> on Saturday January 18, 2014 @12:16PM (#45999097) Homepage

      Mainstreaming reporting started in the last few days. The issue has been reported consistently for nearly a year [apple.com]. I and many other impact users have reported faults in stores, reported via Apple Product Feedback in forums and written to Tim Cook to complain. Not only do they ignore the issues reported on the forum but they also delete posts with links to online forums, news stories and petitions. Nice work Apple.....

      Apple do little on the issue and offer you a (paid for) repair service to fix this systemic fault. The repair being a replacement board that many users report fails again anyway.

    • by puto ( 533470 )
      Iphone 4 Antennae issue, at first they denied it, then they said you were holding it wrong, then they sent you a rubber bumper for it instead of replacing it....
    • Seriously?

      Apple has a history of acknowledging and providing free fixes for issues of this magnitude, if they're really affecting a significant percentage of the population. I've been the beneficiary of such a fix in the past myself.

      Hell, that's even mentioned in the linked article:

      Except when they think they can get away with it. They are one of the better corporate citizens but then the Vatican is the symbol for all things good and righteous as well right? They have been repeatedly sued in Europe about warranty practices, have been caught denying problems and then flat out mass deleting customer complaints on their forums (like with the LG screen issue), and even the NVIDIA GPU issue that plagued a few computers they denied everything until NVIDIA eventually took the blame, after wh

  • Thin and looks over cooling is the apple way

  • Will they take ownership of the issue, or continue to ask customers to pay for an entire new logic board when just the GPU fails?

    That doesn't sound any different from any other manufacturer. The GPU on the laptop is, after all, soldered into the laptop motherboard. Even though is it "just the GPU" it isn't something that can be replaced on its own. I don't know why we should expect Apple to have a different standard for customer service and expected system longevity.

  • by ghack ( 454608 ) on Saturday January 18, 2014 @12:05PM (#45999041)

    Some early/late 2011 refurbs have been popping up on the Apple Refurb Store occasionally still (although there are none on there now there was some several weeks ago). My guess is these are machines Apple is replacing for folks with AppleCare and then they are replacing the logic board and battery and reselling them as refurbs.

    I have a late 2011 (a work machine with applecare) and have never seen any issues.

  • by trparky ( 846769 ) on Saturday January 18, 2014 @12:21PM (#45999133) Homepage
    It's not just Apple that's had an issue with this particular problem. HP has had an issue with their GPUs failing on their motherboards too in their notebooks.

    I'm of the opinion now that notebooks just don't belong having high-end GPUs in them. Notebooks have always had a history of cooling issues because of a variety of issues from inadequate fans or other various issues. Now let's stick the equivalent of a space heater in the device and let's see what happens. I'm really surprised that this sort of thing isn't happening more often to more brands of notebooks.

    Let's face it, a notebook is a portable device with very cramped internals. It's like it's become a form of art to find out just how much more stuff we can cram into an even smaller space. A notebook is a portable device, it's not meant to be your one and only device. If you want to be playing games, get a desktop; not a notebook.
    • by norite ( 552330 )
      Many parallels with the 360 and the RROD....brittle, lead free solder, combined with not enough cooling (no fan, tiny heatsink) due to cramped internals meant that the solder balls under the GPU started to crack. Best solution at the time was to have the GPU reballed with lead solder, which was more flexible and could handle the expansion and contraction of repeated heating/cooling cycles. Now, they're using GPU's that run a lot cooler, plus they stuck a massive fan+heatsink on them with the 360 slim, so th
    • I'm of the opinion now that notebooks just don't belong having high-end GPUs in them. Notebooks have always had a history of cooling issues because of a variety of issues from inadequate fans or other various issues.

      I disagree. My Origin EON17 has been rocking for three years with a GeForce 460M without a problem at all. The issue isn't the GPU. The issue is trying to cram a half-decent GPU into anorexic laptops. Apple frequently trumpets their tech as being "thin", which to many people, is a selling point. I understand that. My laptop is, at its largest point, about 2 inches thick. Finding bags that fit it has been a challenge on many occasions. It weighs over ten pounds, and the power brick is another three.

      The issue

  • by ssimpson ( 133662 ) <slashdot@samsimps o n . c om> on Saturday January 18, 2014 @01:22PM (#45999537) Homepage

    Join the Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/groups/2011mbp/ [facebook.com]

    Keep up to date with the news articles: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Eb-f4R0rWNfK5gPPw4O38bCJZUh5zLTjxj3qSKtqXkA/edit [google.com]

    Mail Tim Cook and express your frustration, politely: tcook[at]apple.com

    Sign the petition: https://www.change.org/en-AU/petitions/timothy-d-cook-replace-or-fix-all-early-2011-macbook-pro-with-graphics-failure [change.org]

  • by nbritton ( 823086 ) on Saturday January 18, 2014 @01:49PM (#45999729)

    What is the root cause? I drive a 32" LCD TV with my Early 2011 MBP, it worked flawlessly in Lion, but Mavericks I have notice many glitches... I just assumed it was Apple's reworking of the multiple monitor code that was flaky. I seem to recall these machines have dual video drivers. If it's the internal ATI Radeon GPU that is faulty, can you force it into internal graphics mode? Or vice versa?

    Is heat a factor? If so, Apple should be able to tweak the cooling thresholds with a firmware update.

    • Is heat a factor? If so, Apple should be able to tweak the cooling thresholds with a firmware update.

      I'm not an engineer, but I don't think that that's going to truly solve the problem at this point.

      Even if Apple did this tomorrow, you still have GPUs with over two years of heat wear involved. Similarly, depending on the situation, maxing out the fans at the first sign of a Youtube video may be nice and all, but depending on the situation, the solution would be to ratchet down the clock speed of the GPU, which will NOT make happy campers out of the people who want that GPU to run at full speed during rende

  • by Lumpy ( 12016 ) on Saturday January 18, 2014 @02:16PM (#45999895) Homepage

    It is only the 15 and 13 inch models. the 17" models do not have the same problems. That makes me happy as my 17" is my workhorse. The only laptop you could buy at the time with a Matte 1920X1080 screen and had decent hardware build. All other brand laptops made in 2011 were garbage with low res or the crap shiny screens.

  • poor fan boys (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Lawrence_Bird ( 67278 ) on Saturday January 18, 2014 @02:23PM (#45999945) Homepage

    guess they wish they had another fan? Those same fan boys want people to believe that we should pay a significant premium for "Apple build quality," yet there are more than enough stories like this one that show Apple build quality (and/or design) is not worth a premium over the likes of Lenovo, HP, etc. Of course, those same fanboys who would trash those companies if the failure was in one of their laptops will simply blame AMD and not Apple for this event.

  • I guess no one looked at the pictures?

    3 LCD cable problems, likely from rough treatment, and one damaged area of liquid crystal from an impact to the back of the case (same thing I did to my Sony VAIO, and had to replace the LCD on the thing).

    Not sure how these qualify as a problem with the GPU. At worst, the one with the wide bars is broken cable strands from some idiot setting the thing down and making a triangle by laying it down face down with the screen open, like you would a book, and the LCD cable w

  • by FaxeTheCat ( 1394763 ) on Saturday January 18, 2014 @03:59PM (#46000567)
    So this is a reason why some countries have consumer rights protecting them from this kind of problem.
    Where I live, there is a mandatory five year protection against manufacturing defects.
    As it happens, my sons 2011 MacBook Pro failed last week. Did not boot. Got it back yesterday with a new motherboard. No cost.

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