Widespread GPU Failures Plague 2011 MacBook Pros with AMD Graphics

Owners of early and late-2011 MacBook Pros with discrete graphics cards are reportedly facing GPU failures and system crashes. Numerous tips sent to MacRumors, a detailed thread on the Apple Support Communities, a Facebook group, and various reports on our forums highlight this issue. These MacBooks, launched on February 28, 2011, are primarily showing screen glitches during graphics-intensive tasks or gaming. Users have reported visible striations, image distortion, or completely blank screens, which can often be temporarily resolved by rebooting.

In addition to graphical problems, these MacBook Pro users are experiencing frequent reboots to a gray screen. Apple has offered several suggestions for those encountering a gray screen, such as booting into safe mode and reinstalling OS X, but these solutions have not resolved the issues for affected users. Apple has performed logic board replacements for some affected users; however, reports indicate that the problem has reoccurred even after a logic board replacement. The cause of these issues remains unclear, though Apple forum users speculate it might be heat-related. The problem seems to affect 15 and 17-inch MacBook Pros with discrete graphics cards. All 2011 MacBooks are equipped with AMD cards, including the AMD Radeon HD 6490M, AMD Radeon HD 6750M (both 512MB/1GB variants), and the AMD Radeon HD 6770M. Mid-2011 iMacs with AMD Radeon HD 6970 graphics cards experienced similar failures, prompting Apple to launch a Graphics Card Replacement Program in August 2013, offering free graphics card replacements for affected iMacs.