MacBook Pro has but the dust

Lozza-p · Oct 18, 2020

Hey guys. My early 2011 mbp has died and I think it might be a logic board issue.

About 5 months ago it would occasionally not start and stay on a black screen with 3 beeps.

I found a guide online and found this to be a bad ram slot. So I’ve been running it with just 1 4gb of ram.
When using it the other day the screen went all pixelated and froze. I rest it and now back to the black screen and 3 beeps. So I’m taking it my other ram slot has now gone bad. My understanding is this is part of the logic board.

I’m not great with computers but hope I’ve explained it well.

Anyone got any ideas?

Rob · Oct 18, 2020

Lozza-p said:
Anyone got any ideas?

It’s 10 years old. Chalk it up as a great experience and order a new one.

jenic · Oct 18, 2020

Same model as my old one, if you are on the original logic board you’ve done very well!

I had a new logic board fitted when it was 4.5 years old as it was a known issue (gpu issues, makes sense you had display issues), this lasted another 5 years but it finally gave up this year. The repair program has ended now but details below:

Apple Initiates Repair Program for 2011-2013 MacBook Pros With Video Issues

Apple has launched a repair program to fix MacBook Pro machines sold between February 2011 and February 2013 that have problems with distorted video,...

www.macrumors.com

It still sold for £200 on eBay as faulty and I got a 16 inch pro, a very nice upgrade after almost 10 years!

ChrisR · Oct 18, 2020

I’ve not used it much lately, but touch wood my early 2011 is still going ok on original board... :/

MarcB · Oct 18, 2020

Im having issues with my MacBook Pro also but its down to hard drives.

Have a look at getting a newer second hand MacBook Pro.

There is one here on ebay for under £400

Pardon our interruption...

Lozza-p · Oct 18, 2020

Am I right in thinking 2012 was the last year you could change bits inside like ram and batteries etc?

I’ve been looking around at newer ones, but mine had a 750 gb hard drive. So will need another one with a large Hard drive. Which seems to make them very expensive

boultonn · Oct 18, 2020

From memory, when they introduced the retina macs in 2012 (got rid of the disk drive etc) they started soldering everything to the logic board so it couldn’t be upgraded

MarcB · Oct 19, 2020

Lozza-p said:
Am I right in thinking 2012 was the last year you could change bits inside like ram and batteries etc?

I’ve been looking around at newer ones, but mine had a 750 gb hard drive. So will need another one with a large Hard drive. Which seems to make them very expensive

boultonn said:
From memory, when they introduced the retina macs in 2012 (got rid of the disk drive etc) they started soldering everything to the logic board so it couldn’t be upgraded

Sure this is correct Mid 2012 are the last of the PHATBooks, With these you can change hard drives, RAM and other parts.

I went form a Early 2010 to a MID 2012, took my 500gb SSD out my 2010 and put it in my 2012.

Im now taking all that out and putting a MX500 1TB SSD in my 2012 and a 120HDD in my optical drive and im running 16gb of RAM also.

If i was you rather than spending the best part of £2k on a new macbook i would look for a Mid 2012 Running a intelcore i7 2.9GHZ
If you need to change to an SSD i would stongly advise using the Crucial MX500 1TB SSD

If you are running a Cruical MX300 SSD in your macbook it needs a firmware update due to security hence why you can not get the MX300 now and the BX SSD's are budget items that are slightly cheaper.