I’m really pissed off. Short story: MacBook Pro 17, HD display, bought this February. Blue line appeared today. I still remember when Apple hardware would work for more than six months.
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I’m really pissed off. Short story: MacBook Pro 17, HD display, bought this February. Blue line appeared today. I still remember when Apple hardware would work for more than six months.
I still remember when you have to sell your car to buy one Macintosh…
WTF?! Apple should really rethink their industry partners… hardware failures on Apple´s products are so usual this days that´s scaring. And it let “scares” on their costumers…
This is why I usually purchase the service plan from PC Connection (even if I didn’t buy the unit there) instead of (or in addition to) AppleCare. Three years of hardware protection costs much less than one screen. BTW, this endorsement is submitted without compensation of any kind — I just don’t want to see people having bad experiences.
I do have an AppleCare for this machine, but I had to buy it in UK. Unfortunately, Apple still doesn’t sell AppleCare packages in Portugal. Anyway, even knowing that the screen will be replaced, it’s completely unacceptable. I know a lot of people who own a Mac, and the vast majority of them already had problems with their hardware. This was NOT like that before. Apple hardware quality is crap now. It stinks. The only thing that keeps me buying Macs is Mac OS X.
I’ve had the same problem and they have replaced the whole lcd-panel..!
I have the same problem on my MacBook Pro (purchased 06-2007). Ive already had the logic board replaced due to the display going completely out, now this.
Miguel, what did they replace/fix on your machine? I still have Applecare, so they will be getting a call from me this week.
On my Mac, the screen (and probably the upper half of the clamshell) was replaced. If your Mac is still under AppleCare, you don’t have to worry about that, just drop it on a service center, and they’ll figure out what to do.
This is the exact same thing my macbook pro has right now. I am just debating whether I should repair it.
@Miguel, Did Apple say exactly what was wrong? If they replaced the screen assembly, I suspect that it may have been a kink in the ribbon cable that goes from the logic board to the screen. Opening/closing the hinge over time weakens the wire and it fails. Sucks that nobody has come up with a better design for this, since Ive had this happen on other laptops as well.
@mark, I take it you don’t have Applecare. Laptop repairs are expensive, probably not worth repairing. If it is the ribbon cable that I am thinking, then other wires on that cable may start to fail causing more lines.
I don’t have the experience of someone who spends their working days fixing things like this, but I’ve seen my share of problems caused by failing cables, and the symptoms are quite different. Grabbled colors, digital noise, etc. My Powerbook G4 had that problem to the extent of displaying only random pixels, something close to and old TV tunned to a dead channel. This problem (a static blue vertical line) is most probably caused by the TFT panel itself, probably one of the transistors that controls that column’s pixels died.
I think the only reason why they replaced the assembly was because the service part contains the assembly itself, they don’t ship the display without it. I think that’s because there are different manufactures for the “same” panels, and each manufacturer requires a slightly different assembly to fit in, so they prefer to ship the whole thing to avoid problems.
@mark, what you do depends on how old is your laptop, how much is the repair, etc. If your laptop still serves you well, I would pay the new screen, it’s usually less than half a new MacBook Pro. Also, you can check ebay for cheaper parts. I’ve bought an used TFT for my Pismo (a friend broke it with a football – don’t ask) on ebay, installed it, and it’s working up to today.
Any ideas what would make the line go away? Its been on my screen the entire week and last night it disappeared. Im sure it will be back, since the first time I saw the line was months ago for a couple of seconds. I planned on calling Apple tonight and sending it in for repair, but if they dont see the line then nothing will be fixed.
In my case, at first is appeared to be random, although it seemed leaving a static dark image on the screen would make the line show up after a while, and as soon as I moved a large chuck of the image (like a window), it would go away. Some days latter, it got permanent, and never went away again until the screen was replaced.
I suggest you grab a photo or video camera, and have it ready to snap a picture of the screen as soon as the line shows up again. That was the main purpose of the image I used in my blog. Me and the guys from the Mac repair shop are friends and trust each other, so it was not a question of disbelieving, but more of describing the problem if it actually didn’t happen there. But it did, no photo was needed. :)
I just called Apple Care this morning. Its funny that they make you go through all the standard troubleshooting like restarting the computer, removing the battery, clearing the PRAM, etc. when its obviously a hardware issue. The CSR finally said its most likely a hardware issue after I told her that I see the line on the bootup screen, each time I restart the computer. Awhile back I had some issues reading some DVD movies. I dont use the optical drive much but the CSR had me put the Leopard install disc in to run some utilities. Problem is I coudnt get the optical drive to stop spitting the disc back out. Now its going in for repair for the screen and optical drive.
I take very good care of my gadgets, especially this $2k laptop. It hardly ever leaves the house. Even though I love my MBP, I am very disappointed on the quality control of the MBPs. For the price, you should be getting top notch quality.
Quality control? What quality control?
i just had a blue line on my 2010 macbook pro, it’s the matte screen which means it hasn’t the a glass screen in front of the display so i can actually touch the dislay
if you gently push on your screen (IF you can touch it, that is) the line disappears!