Hi, been a while since I've been here! I took in a April 2011 macbook pro with the dreaded white screen issue. I backup up his data after doing the usual things, Reset PRAM/NVRAM, tried to boot to recovery, no go, not there. Finally just booted to tech tools from usb and wiped and repartitioned the hard drive to do clean install of el Capitan, boots to apple, halfway along line stops, reboots to white screen. Fine. I roll back to clock and try the orig osx, snow leopard, boots to apple symbol and hangs. I already ran hd and other system tests. . Ideas??
Mscbook pro april 2011 can't install any osx
- Thread starter ell
- Start date
NviGate Systems
Well-Known Member
- Reaction score
- 1,022
- Location
- Vancouver
Looking around, it seems a White Screen is both a generic error and a GPU error. So, if you are having this much issue, despite OS version or method, I would propose you may be facing a hardware error caused by faulty mainboard. (To be specific it's likely the GPU however, on Macs it's part of the mainboard.)
NviGate Systems
Well-Known Member
- Reaction score
- 1,022
- Location
- Vancouver
More than likely the bootable tools don't load any extensions that enable anything specific for GPU and instead rely on the ROM Toolbox basic driver, which the GPU doesn't crash with.
Essentially, as soon as you try and use the GPU for anything other than basic, it crashes.
Essentially, as soon as you try and use the GPU for anything other than basic, it crashes.
ahhh, thanks for explaining.
NviGate Systems
Well-Known Member
- Reaction score
- 1,022
- Location
- Vancouver
There were many cases of users who had iMacs that ran early versions of Mac OS X, and had GPU's that were near failure. However, the load that Mac OS put on the GPU were low, as these were systems that were used for basic tasks like E-Mail, Videos and Browsing. If they had continued at that version of Mac OS, likely those systems would have lasted longer. They would have eventually failed, for sure, but it would have been a slow march.
However, within a few months of upgrading to a new OS, the increased GPU usage from new "eye candy" within Mac OS, which was offloaded to the GPU, caused those GPU to accelerate the failures.
Just to be clear, the GPU'S were failing, but the amount they were used didn't cause any visible effects, but a sudden increase in use accelerated that failure.
I mentioned this as many clients blame the "latest" updates as having killed the system, but in reality the system was already failing, just not exhibiting symptoms.
However, within a few months of upgrading to a new OS, the increased GPU usage from new "eye candy" within Mac OS, which was offloaded to the GPU, caused those GPU to accelerate the failures.
Just to be clear, the GPU'S were failing, but the amount they were used didn't cause any visible effects, but a sudden increase in use accelerated that failure.
I mentioned this as many clients blame the "latest" updates as having killed the system, but in reality the system was already failing, just not exhibiting symptoms.
Similar threads
