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dialo · May 21, 2006, 08:11 PM

I'm on my 3rd MacBook (stock white 2 GHz) and this one gets shadow glitches. This seems to be connected with either the cube effect in general (which I used as the transition effect for multiple desktop apps) or perhaps the transition from full screen in Parallels, which uses the cube effect in the process.

Anyone know anything about this? Could it be a hardware problem? Perhaps a problem with Parallels. I've already tried reinstalling OS X.

chabig · May 21, 2006, 08:19 PM

Have you installed third-party themes? I see a purple band under your menu bar that is not standard. Remove any themes and report back.

Chris

dialo · May 21, 2006, 08:22 PM

The purple band is one of the shadow glitches. It looks like that's the shadow under the menu bar. There are no themes or UI mods.

Kerrigan · May 21, 2006, 08:29 PM

It looks better that way

Anywhoo, why is this your 3rd MacBook?

dialo · May 21, 2006, 08:32 PM

Originally Posted by Kerrigan

It looks better that way

Anywhoo, why is this your 3rd MacBook?

First one had a fan that was rubbing, making it extremely loud, the second had a bad trackpad button.

Kerrigan · May 21, 2006, 08:45 PM

That's pretty bad dude, where are you buying your MacBooks? I would definitely complain, in a very angry manner, to someone either at Apple or at the store where you bought it.

I want to get a MacBook, but if something like this happened to me I would get my money back and buy something else.

dialo · May 21, 2006, 08:49 PM

Originally Posted by Kerrigan

That's pretty bad dude, where are you buying your MacBooks?

3 Different Chicago area stores: #1 from Northbrook, #2 from Michigan Ave, #3 from Old Orchard.

I want to get a MacBook, but if something like this happened to me I would get my money back and buy something else.

Yeah, I'm starting to dislike being locked into apple hardware. It shouldn't be such a challenge to get a properly working notebook that runs OS X.

chabig · May 21, 2006, 09:14 PM

Have you applied all firmware updates?

chabig · May 21, 2006, 09:15 PM

Also, run the hardware test that comes with the MacBook.

Chris

dialo · May 21, 2006, 09:38 PM

Originally Posted by chabig

Have you applied all firmware updates?

I've applied all updates. I don't think there is a firmware update for the MacBooks:
http://www.apple.com/support/downloads/

Originally Posted by chabig

Also, run the hardware test that comes with the MacBook.

No problems found.

harrisjamieh · May 22, 2006, 02:01 AM

You say its a white MB... looks black to me in that picture

screamingFit · May 22, 2006, 05:13 AM

I'm sure the lights were out so the screen could be photographed correctly.

I haven't had glitches that stayed on the screen but have noticed that when doing anything that was like Dashboard, cube rotations, Front Row startup (Quartz??) it would "blip" with some tearing, corruption, etc. in part of the screen. The problem doesn't happen all the time and isn't really annoying but wondering if it's related?

harrisjamieh · May 22, 2006, 05:18 AM

Could be the similar sort of thing that the iMac CDs had when ordered with the 256 x1600's. I'm sure if this is a relativly widespread problem, or even if it affects just a few, an update will be out soon to fix it, just like with the iMacs

dialo · May 22, 2006, 07:42 AM

I've come to realize that it has some relationship to the RAM, since it happens when a lot of ram is being used. That makes sense since what's getting corrupted are the shadows that are being cached by the graphics chip. I'm guessing that either there's something wrong with the integrated graphics or there is something wrong with the RAM, although I've seen no other indication of problems with the RAM in applications.

harrisjamieh · May 22, 2006, 07:52 AM

Originally Posted by dialo

I've come to realize that it has some relationship to the RAM, since it happens when a lot of ram is being used. That makes sense since what's getting corrupted are the shadows that are being cached by the graphics chip. I'm guessing that either there's something wrong with the integrated graphics or there is something wrong with the RAM, although I've seen no other indication of problems with the RAM in applications.

Have you upgraded the RAM? If you have, put the stock RAM back in and see if it happens

dialo · May 22, 2006, 08:06 AM

Originally Posted by harrisjamieh

Have you upgraded the RAM? If you have, put the stock RAM back in and see if it happens

No. I've done nothing with the RAM.

Originally Posted by harrisjamieh

You say its a white MB... looks black to me in that picture

Uh, it's white. The camera adjusted the exposure because of the bright light source.

dialo · May 22, 2006, 10:01 AM

Update: it seems to be a problem with the integrated graphics. The problem apparently showed up with the minis when they came out.

http://discussions.apple.com/thread....191465#2191465
http://discussions.apple.com/thread....&tstart=45
http://episteme.arstechnica.com/grou...m/473001408731

There is some speculation that it's perhaps a problem with how the GMA950 handles low system RAM (although some folks with 1 GB have reported the issue) and/or a driver issue. At least one person got a replacement and it also had the issue.

harrisjamieh · May 22, 2006, 10:14 AM

As I said earlier, this is probably a similar situation to the iMac tearing problem when config'd with 256 VRAM. I would have said not to bother returning the machine, but looking at those pictures, even if a fix does come out, I doubt I could live with that problem for the forseeable future, so I would say you need to get yourself a replacement if you have not done so already