Apple Trash Can (late 2013) graphics card issues

[MIDI Life Crisis]

According to the technician repairing my new Mac, the graphics card issue is rampant. They get several a week that require graphic card replacements. Apple has not "reached the threshold" where it is a recall, but according to my source, it will be a recall. Too many repairs.

So I'm back on the 8 core for a few days and will have a nice new graphics card installed.

[BKK-OZ]

hmmm... no graphics card problems with my NMP (touch wood!).

I have had some weird intermittent freezes with my mouse, but I put that down to Logitech's Control Centre and other weirdness, not hardware.

[MIDI Life Crisis]

The freezes could be the graphic card. That was the dominant crash feature this week.

[BKK-OZ]

You had mouse feezes?
(mice frozes?)

[monkey man]

Now, if Apple hadn't have crammed such high-spec cards (that most musos simply don't need) into these beasties, my guess is that this wouldn't have happened.

Furthermore, the trash cans would've been a whole lot more affordable for we mere musicians, and who knows, Apple might've sold a shed-load of these puppies. IMHO, of course.

[MIDI Life Crisis]

You had mouse feezes?
(mice frozes?)

Oooops! Sorry, BKK. I was confusing the spinning beachball with a cursor freeze. No, no instance where the cursor would stop moving. Weirdly, however, the beachball would sometimes turn to an arrow cursor if moved outside the current program, but would still not let you click on the background app that allowed the pointer. No force quit via CMD-OPT-esc was possible either.

Frankly, regardless of the annoyance, once the graphics card is replaced the machine should be pretty nice. The 2003 8-core is still a champ and cloning the SSD to an SATA has kept me up and running exactly where I left off. Fortunately I'm between projects and have another few days before I need to get to work. If something does need attention immediately, it's good to know there is no down time.

[cuttime]

Well, all of this sucks! All of my vicarious thrills of the bleeding edge has been tempered. The trashcan Mac should have been the greatest thing since canned beans, and I suspect it soon will be, but in the mean time, I'm really sorry for all the transitional problems you have suffered. Just remember, it's still not Windows!

[MIDI Life Crisis]

Well, it's not all bad. The transition issues were partly related to trying to migrate the system with the automated Migration Ass. app. Manual migration (sans the actual system) should always be installed fresh IMO and will be with every new machine transition.

TimeMachine is great for archive and insurance purposes, and maybe even for restoring a crashed disk, but for migration to a new machine it kind of sucks sometimes. Also, there was a lot of legacy stuff that contributed to the graphics issues and could be corrected. Unfortunately that is not helpful when trying to track down a more serious issue - like a bad graphics card.

Thing is, Apple knows the cards are bad. They are just waiting to see who brings them in for replacement and who doesn't - what they call a "threshold." If they issue a recall they have to honor it for years to come. If they don't issue the recall they're only on the hook for the handful of folks who took the time to bring their precious trash can into the shop. And if they don't issue the recall and the cards fail later when Applecare is not in effect, they can snag a few more bucks on card replacements and service.

Perhaps that is not their total strategy (tea think!) but in effect that's what we consumers see as our reality. I'm just glad we know what's going on and it can be addressed now. The situation has forced me to get my studio better networked, turning the "old" 8 core and trash can into one powerful system. Probably way more powerful than I need. I suppose it's time to spring for VE PRO, especially since it'll have MAS support.

[mikehalloran]

Which graphics card do you have or does this affect all three?

[MIDI Life Crisis]

The machine is in the shop so I can't answer that. I just came form the authorized repair place and was told they could not duplicate the issue and Apple would not replace the "B" graphics card unless there was a problem they could document. When I pressed them they agreed to replace the card (WT...?) I've been going back and forth with Applecare for 2 weeks now and the service guys couldn't access any of that information even though 2nd tier Applecare said they included extensive documentation in the case report.

It's pretty effin annoying and there is a great temptation to enact my American Express customer service agreement and have the machine refunded and move to a PC once and for all. But I'm probably just angry and will cool off... maybe! Grrrrrrrr........

[cuttime]

and move to a PC once and for all. But I'm probably just angry and will cool off... maybe! Grrrrrrrr........

I'm here to talk you down...

[MIDI Life Crisis]

OK, what kills me is I had that same dot matrix printer! I wonder if he smokes the same brand I did?

[MIDI Life Crisis]

OMG! That looks like a Newport pack on the CPU! It is my destiny!!! I knew I should have stayed with Marlboros.

[MIDI Life Crisis]

Update:

This from Apple at 5:30AM today...

"My apologies for the communication breakdown between AppleCare and the Apple Authorized Service Provider... The AASPs are not able to access the same system for case logging that we are for some reason, only Apple Stores and AppleCare. I’m not sure the reason for this, but communication between them and us would be useful and I will bring this up for sure."

Wow. That gives me great hope for how Apple is working to improve this aspect of their service.

[MIDI Life Crisis]

Update: Machine back in the studio and working like a charm! Whew! Now I need to find a name for the beast... Darth is tempting...