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spiff72 · Mar 6, 2011, 06:55 PM

Hey everyone...

I think I need to get Applecare (or a Genius Bar) involved ASAP, but I am having random freezes on my 17" MBP (early 2008). I have a feeling that it is a hardware problem (not software), but I have a feeling I won't be able to get the problem to replicate itself when I bring it to an Apple store. Will they take my word for it and actually give it a once-over?

I only have about a month left on my Applecare and want to make sure whatever is wrong gets fixed.

My symptoms - the computer just locks up at random times - mouse won't move, keyboard won't respond, menubar clock stops updating, etc. I have to hold the power button down and restart. I have also seen instances where Airport won't turn on (via the dropdown menubar or via Network Preferences). A few minutes ago, the dropdown for the Airport icon in the menubar said "No Airport Card Installed".

Something else that makes be think it is hardware related is that I was my windows bootcamp partition flaked out on me, so I deleted the partition, and went through the process of reinstalling Windows 7, and the installation program froze on me (twice) during the "first run" stage of the process - once on the page where you enter the product key, and then when it was trying to set up my network. Obviously this was completely outside of OSX.

When I bring my Mac to the Genius Bar, I always wipe it and install Snow Leopard (clean) so they can't blame any issues on 3rd party apps (and to wipe my personal data off the machine). I was running it like this for a day or so, and didn't have any issues, but this whole bootcamp Windows 7 thing convinced me that there was a hardware issue.

Do you think this might be the logic board or could it be just the airport card? Could a bad Airport card cause a complete system freeze?

Thanks in advance for your help!
Jeff

spiff72 · Mar 6, 2011, 07:00 PM

One more thing - I just created a new User Account on the machine and am using that for a while to see if I get a lockup under that one.

AKcrab · Mar 6, 2011, 07:03 PM

Do you have a usb mouse and keyboard you can try when it locks up? That would eliminate an issue with the top case. I would get it to a shop ASAP.

spiff72 · Mar 6, 2011, 09:53 PM

Originally Posted by AKcrab

Do you have a usb mouse and keyboard you can try when it locks up? That would eliminate an issue with the top case. I would get it to a shop ASAP.

I do have a bluetooth mouse, and I will give it a try. However - I have my doubts that it is just the mouse and keyboard. The reason I think this is that when it happens - even the clock in the menubar freezes the time.

I just wiped my drive again and reinstalled Snow Leopard, and it actually locked up on the setup screen when I was trying to enter my apple ID.

It then locked up when I tried to run the boot camp assistant. I was struggling to get it to write the windows support software to a DVD or external disk, so I closed the lid to put the kids to bed. When I picked the machine up and placed it in my lap I could tell it was locked again because it was warm to the touch. I opened the lid, and the backlight wouldn't come on, but I could still just barely see the screen was on. I had to hold the power button down to shut it down.

Ugh. I am trying to find the best way to make this easy to replicate on demand. It might just be turning off airport and then back on. It seems that more times than not it will refuse to turn back on...

Thanks for the suggestion...
Jeff

AKcrab · Mar 6, 2011, 10:51 PM

That sounds like bad RAM, failed logic board, or failed hard drive.

spiff72 · Mar 7, 2011, 09:38 AM

Is Apple still picky about 3rd party RAM in a machine? I immediately swapped out the 2 gigs that came in the machine for 4 gigs (can't recall the brand - maybe Patriot). I have the machine at work with me and I am running loops of diagnostic tests on it and I did the same overnight and it finds no errors (including HDD surface scans). I tried to find the original RAM that I pulled out just in case I could try swapping that back in, but I can't find it.

I seem to recall hearing that they won't touch a machine with 3rd party RAM, but they may have relaxed that policy since then?

AKcrab · Mar 7, 2011, 04:32 PM

They may very well yank your RAM and put some Apple RAM in it for testing. They DO like to blame 3rd party RAM, so it would behoove you to find your original sticks if you can.

spiff72 · Mar 9, 2011, 10:20 PM

Well - I found my original RAM and swapped it out for my Mushkin 4GB.

I had another freeze within 20 minutes, so it clearly isn't a RAM problem.

I dropped it off at the Genius Bar this evening - hopefully I will get it back by Monday/Tuesday! I am posting this on a 6 year old emachines (yuck) laptop. Wow - this machine makes me REALLY appreciate why I switched to a Mac (PB G4) 6 years ago!

spiff72 · Mar 12, 2011, 02:48 PM

Update:

Well - I was hoping that my MBP would be shipped back to me on Friday, since the status showed that the repair was completed and was pending return shipment. However, the status never updated (it was supposedly done at noon EST). I called today and they said that it was still waiting on a part - from the description they said they were waiting on RAM modules. After I got off the phone I was concerned that if they were only replacing the RAM I would be having continued issues since I had actually already tried swapping out the RAM.

So I called back and asked if they could see whether anything else had already been replaced. The rep said that the notes indicated that they may have replaced the Airport card and the Logic Board already (but she said it can be difficult to be sure of this (just by reading the notes) until the repair was actually complete.

This made me feel a bit better about getting a properly functioning machine back next week. Hopefully the RAM doesn't take long to arrive - especially since I will be swapping it out for my Mushkin RAM as soon as it arrives!

If they swapped the logic board, RAM, and Airport card, does this leave anything else that won't be "new"? Are there additional modules that are separate from the Logic board?

Thanks
Jeff

AKcrab · Mar 12, 2011, 05:04 PM

They didn't have RAM in stock? I find that hard to believe...

There is a left I/O board that should have nothing to do with freezes and the optical drive, but they've replaced the main components for sure. (Assuming they did the logic board.)

spiff72 · Mar 12, 2011, 05:06 PM

Originally Posted by AKcrab

They didn't have RAM in stock? I find that hard to believe...

There is a left I/O board that should have nothing to do with freezes and the optical drive, but they've replaced the main components for sure. (Assuming they did the logic board.)

I thought the same thing - logic board and airport card are in stock, but no RAM? I realize this is older slower RAM than the current gen MBP, but wow.

spiff72 · Mar 17, 2011, 12:57 PM

Well - it arrived on Tuesday this week, and no issues. They did replace the airport card, the logic board, and either 1 or 2 of the memory modules. It doesn't show a quantity of RAM - just "1GB Memory Module" - so it isn't clear if they replaced them both or just one. It doesn't really matter, since I put my 4GB of Mushkin RAM back in it before I even powered it on!

Waragainstsleep · Mar 17, 2011, 01:35 PM

For the record if you insist on erasing your hard drive before you get a repair (especially for issues which are tough to replicate) at least save your system logs for the engineers.

spiff72 · Mar 17, 2011, 01:44 PM

Originally Posted by Waragainstsleep

For the record if you insist on erasing your hard drive before you get a repair (especially for issues which are tough to replicate) at least save your system logs for the engineers.

I actually erased and reinstalled SL on the drive, and the problem continued - I did save a bunch of log files and a screen grab showing that the Airport Card was showing "Not detected" on the desktop menu pulldown. I have always wondered if the technicians actually look at that stuff.

I did this before with a Powerbook that had flickering pixels on the screen intermittently, so I shot a video file of it with a camera and saved it on the desktop, but they initially claimed that they couldn't duplicate the problem.

Waragainstsleep · Mar 17, 2011, 01:53 PM

Not everything is recorded in the logs. Pixel issues or flickering backlights being prime examples. Freezes caused by RAM won't necessarily record anything either but Kernel panics are always logged and you can often diagnose a cause in seconds from the panic log. It varies a bit from issue to issue but proof is always helpful to an engineer when it comes to intermittent problems. Most display issues can be immediately narrowed to down between the panel and the logic board by an experienced engineer if they can see the symptom in a pic or video.

spiff72 · Mar 17, 2011, 02:07 PM

Originally Posted by Waragainstsleep

Not everything is recorded in the logs. Pixel issues or flickering backlights being prime examples. Freezes caused by RAM won't necessarily record anything either but Kernel panics are always logged and you can often diagnose a cause in seconds from the panic log. It varies a bit from issue to issue but proof is always helpful to an engineer when it comes to intermittent problems. Most display issues can be immediately narrowed to down between the panel and the logic board by an experienced engineer if they can see the symptom in a pic or video.

Yes - I looked over the logs and nothing was jumping out at me. It looked like the freezes didn't get in there. There would usually be something that said "Abnormal shutdown detected" (paraphrased), logged at the time of the following reboot.

It never actually panicked on me. (In my 6 years of Mac use, I think I have seen just one KP in that whole timeframe.)

Thanks
Jeff