#Macbook pro 2011 hard drive failure software

The first part of the process involves prepping the software side of the Mac by doing the following: I'm not going to rehash the entire article from RealMacMods (after all, they found the process, and they also offer it as a service for $85 for anyone not willing or able to do it himself!), but I did want to highlight a few parts where I think it's important to further illustrate what needs to happen. Better than telling my sister to junk the laptop! Hardware hack to cut off the GPU entirely but then I scrolled further in that Stack Exchange answer, and noticed a link to this interesting article: MacBook 2011 Radeon GPU Disable - Real Radeongate Solution.Д«eing somewhat handy with a soldering iron (but having never done SMD work-basically, soldering little bits and bobs that are the size of a speck of dust!), I thought I'd give it a go. Hitting dead ends when attempting the software fix, I was about ready to throw in the towel. But this time it would reboot itself within a minute or so, so that was different! Alas, after hacking around a bit more with System Integrity Protection disabled, the reboot cycle eventually became quite short indeed: That answer had a fairly comprehensive guide to-using software changes only-disable the Radeon GPU and get the Mac happy again.ДЄfter running through the guide twice, I eventually got the Mac to boot. Lucky for me, I found this answer on Stack Exchange: GPU problem - Boot Hangs on Grey Screen. The only thing that seemed wrong was the Radeon GPU. Single user mode proved disk, RAM, CPU, and even integrated graphics were okay. Obviously everything else was working fine-Internet Recovery proved wifi/networking was okay. but then I thought twice-I would look if there was any possible way to resurrect this thing. I was going to pop out the SSD and RAM, and suggest my sister sell the laptop for scrap. kext files (Kernel Extensions) are loaded. I didn't see anything obviously wrong, but knowing from past experience that problems usually surface only when the GPU/Radeon. A few records were off, but they were repaired successfully. Getting nervous, I then tried single-user mode (hold down Command + S from startup sound until you see the matrix text going past as the Mac boots into its FreeBSD underpinnings)-and was happy to find at least this worked fine.

Internet Recovery mode (hold down Option + Command + R from startup sound to Apple logo)-same thing, again.

Recovery mode (hold down Command + R from startup sound to Apple logo)-same thing, again.

Safe mode (hold down Shift from startup sound through to login or desktop)-same thing, stuck on grey screen after Apple logo + progress bar.

Ten minutes later, still a grey screen-and the fans are spinning madly. Apple logo, then progress bar, then grey screen. Huh-usually the GPU issue would present itself during the AHT, but not this time. I ran the quick test, which found no errors. Replacing the slow hard drive with an SSD makes this thing feel brand new! Beginning of the Debugging JourneyДЇearing the worst, I rebooted into the Apple Hardware Test mode (right after startup sound, hold 'D' key). Horizontal banding, some weird color issues. But then, I noticed the display would 'glitch'. First off, it was using a slow 5200 RPM hard disk after replacing that with a nice, fast SSD, and ensuring she had 8 GB of RAM in the laptop, I was pretty pleased with my work, and was about to shut down the laptop and send it on its way.

My sister just turned over her 2011 15' MacBook Pro, which she said was running slow, and I dug in. I've handled three 2011 MacBook Pros (none of them my own-I had an Air back then), and all three of them were scrapped because of the GPU issue.

#Macbook pro 2011 hard drive failure free

The problem was so rampant, Apple was forced to set up a free repair program for affected MacBook Pros-though the 2011 model has since been dropped from that program. There was a major flaw in the AMD Radeon GPUs included with that model year's logic board which seemed to cause GPU failure either due to overheating, internal chip problems, BGA solder joints getting broken, or a combination of the above. The 2011 MacBook Pro has, for almost a decade, been the exception to that rule.

#Macbook pro 2011 hard drive failure series

I've been a Mac user for years, and I've repaired hundreds of different Macs, from the early II series to the latest 20 model MacBook Pros, iMacs (and other Apple hardware to boot!), and there is almost never a hardware situation where I've thrown in the towel and told someone to ditch their Mac.