Apple has released a statement that may affect those of you with newer MacBook Pros with Nvidia GeForce 8600M GT graphics cards. Said graphics cards have been known to be faulty and may cause video to be scrambled or distorted. Mine is doing just fine – BTW.
In July 2008, NVIDIA publicly acknowledged a higher than normal failure rate for some of their graphics processors due to a packaging defect. At that same time, NVIDIA assured Apple that Mac computers with these graphics processors were not affected. However, after an Apple-led investigation, Apple has determined that some MacBook Pro computers with the NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT graphics processor may be affected. If the NVIDIA graphics processor in your MacBook Pro has failed, or fails within two years of the original date of purchase, a repair will be done free of charge, even if your MacBook Pro is out of warranty.
Specific products affected:
MacBook Pro 15-inch and 17-inch models with NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT graphics processors
MacBook Pro (17-Inch, 2.4GHz)
MacBook Pro (15-Inch, 2.4/2.2GHz)
MacBook Pro (Early 2008)
These computers were manufactured between approximately May 2007 and September 2008
Who wants an Nvidia chipset in their MacBook now? Heh.
Update: Nvidia would like to have have their say in the matter, so they don’t look like jerks, which is sort of alluded to in Apple’s statement.
NVIDIA has worked diligently with Apple, as we have done with all of our customers and partners, to analyze notebooks and determine if there are potential problems.
Our analysis showed that a failure in an Apple MacBook Pro notebook is remote.
However, the OEM is ultimately best able to assess the reliability of their systems.
Apple, like other OEMs, decides on their own how to handle their warranty and repair programs.
Regardless, we stand by our products, thus the reason why we set aside such a large reserve, and we have and will continue to work closely with Apple and their customers..