Al iMac Owners: When Did You Buy Your Systems?

[nakile]

I'm trying to see if their is any relation with when the system was bought and people who are having video problems. Selection the option that best applies to you.

I'm allowing multiple options. Many of you have had problems with your original unit(s) but had them later replaced with systems that work fine. Input all the units you've had into the poll.

If you've had no problems, select all the options that apply to you also. The more data from both sides, the better.

It will be interesting to see if this forms a trend. Perhaps this is happening with units made early in the Al iMacs life?

 

[MAW]

I'm trying to see if their is any relation with when the system was bought and people who are having video problems. Selection the option that best applies to you.

I'm allowing multiple options. Many of you have had problems with your original unit(s) but had them later replaced with systems that work fine. Input all the units you've had into the poll.

If you've had no problems, select all the options that apply to you also. The more data from both sides, the better.

It will be interesting to see if this forms a trend. Perhaps this is happening with units made early in the Al iMacs life?

Bought mine mid Oct. at brick and mortar Apple Store(Glendale Galleria, to be exact). No chronic freezing, though........

froze twice in WOW on med. high settings(randomly, not repeatable)

froze(repeatable) in front row in movie menu when scrolling to a video podcast that somehow made it into the movie category in itunes(??!?)fine after I removed it.

Just updated to 10.5 yesterday(archive and install) and everything appears to be ok still. Have yet to install 1.3 update but plan to tonight. Will post any useful results.

Also, I wonder if the poll might benifit from adding an option for 3rd party ram, what vendor, etc...(?)

 

[nakile]

I'm starting to wonder if I should have asked for manufacturing date and not purchase date? That would be a little more concrete because units can set in storage for a long time, such as high end models that don't sell as much.

How easy it it to find the manufacturing date of a Mac?

 

[SaSaSushi]

I'm starting to wonder if I should have asked for manufacturing date and not purchase date? That would be a little more concrete because units can set in storage for a long time, such as high end models that don't sell as much.

How easy it it to find the manufacturing date of a Mac?

Extremely simple:

http://coconut-flavour.com/coconutidentitycard/index.html

Mine was purchased 8/7 and manufactured 8/13-8/19 and has no graphics issues.

I agree your poll would have probably offered more useful data with the manufacture dates.

 

[AlexisV]

Good poll. Even though we're not going off serials, it will hopefully show some sort of trend.

 

[Alloye]

I purchased my 24" about a week after the announcement. Haven't had a single freeze in either Tiger or Leopard.

 

[Rental01]

Wouldn't a better poll be about the week build numbers? That would let us know if Apple has been able to curb the graphics problems and may be an indicator into the freezing issues.

Just a thought, as I'm still a newb here and don't even have my imac yet.

 

[nakile]

Not really enough information yet to really say anything. However, the number of bad and good units so far is:

• 10 with graphics problems
• 32 without graphics problems

Wouldn't that be a 3.2:1 ratio (for every 3.2 good units there is 1 bad unit)?

But there is a slight trend at the moment. It seems the number of bad units is quite sporadic where as the number of good units seems to die down after early August and slowly start to rise afterwards.

But like I said, still a little to early to try to call anything.

 

[BlakTornado]

I voted Late August AND Early September because I ordered Late August (So it could have been an August model) but it arrived September (6th to be exact) so it could have been a september model. Not sure.

 

[ucfgrad93]

Late August for me, and thankfully, I have no problems with it.

 

[nakile]

Huh, I think I've come across something...

Anbody notice this is happening only with the 2.4GHz and 2.8 GHz models? Those units have the ATI Radeon 2600 Pro in them. Perhaps all these problems are being caused by that?

I really have no doubt this is hardware related anymore. The 2.0GHz with the 2400XT seem totaly fine.

 

[pechspilz]

Huh, I think I've come across something...
I really have no doubt this is hardware related anymore. The 2.0GHz with the 2400XT seem totaly fine.

That is not the case. I have the 20" with the 2400xt and it freezes too. It usually happened in iMovie. I'm not using the Mac a lot anymore because every time I look at the horrible, washed out screen I'm getting depressed so I don't know if the recent fixes changed anything.

 

[hollerz]

Bought either late September or early October (can't remember), no graphics problems at all! According to coconutIdentityCard it was built "Between 13.08.2007 and 19.08.2007" in Shanghai, China

 

[SaSaSushi]

Bought either late September or early October (can't remember), no graphics problems at all! According to coconutIdentityCard it was built "Between 13.08.2007 and 19.08.2007" in Shanghai, China

This proves the theory that the results of this poll are skewed. I ordered mine on the day of release (8/7) and it was in the exact same manufacturing batch as yours in Shanghai.

I think you need to redo this poll to glean any useful results. I think there may be something there you just have to do it based on the manufacture dates.

EDIT: I just posted a new revised poll based on manufacture date along with some links to utilities for determining the info.

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/381292/

 

[craig1410]

Hi,
I bought mine on 11th August from an Apple premier partner store and it was one of three which they received on the day of release. CoconutIdentityCard says it was built between 16/07/07 and 22/07/07 in Shanghai.

I (touch wood) haven't been getting the sort of freezing which some have reported and it can run for 2 or 3 weeks without freezing and then upon reboot it can freeze 3 times in a row, sometimes before I even get logged in. Once it boots up there is a good chance it will run trouble free for days or weeks once again. These problems seemed to begin after update 1.1.

Before update 1.1 I did have some issues in boot camp when running 3D intense games (FIA GTR Racing) where I would get those white sparkles on black backgrounds shortly before it would lock up. This didn't always occur an if the sparkles were absent then the game would run indefinitely without any issues. I don't believe that heat is an issue either.

I have now applied update 1.2 and upon reboot I shut it back down and did a SMC and PRAM reset. It froze before I could log in again... I did this again and it froze again. I then did 3 PRAM resets in a row and it booted up fine. I've not had any lockups yet but it's too early to tell if the issue is resolved.

Cheers,
Craig.

 

[SaSaSushi]

Hi,
I bought mine on 11th August from an Apple premier partner store and it was one of three which they received on the day of release. CoconutIdentityCard says it was built between 16/07/07 and 22/07/07 in Shanghai.

Craig.

Sorry to hear about your freezing, Craig but I appreciate your information which has now totally thrown my own poll into uselessness! I had forgotten that of course they were manufacturing them several weeks before the release date.

I hope your problems get worked out soon.

 

[craig1410]

Sorry to hear about your freezing, Craig but I appreciate your information which has now totally thrown my own poll into uselessness! I had forgotten that of course they were manufacturing them several weeks before the release date.

I hope your problems get worked out soon.

Can't you change your poll or even just delete it and start again? I see there is only a single vote so far. I've not created a poll before so I don't know if this is possible.

Sorry to mess up your poll...

Just another thought - since it is likely that this freezing issue only really came to light after the August release date, after reports of problems started to come in, it is unlikely that any hardware changes will have been made before then. Perhaps your current poll is valid on the assumption that all machines before August 7th are "equal"?

Cheers,
Craig.

 

[SaSaSushi]

Can't you change your poll or even just delete it and start again? I see there is only a single vote so far. I've not created a poll before so I don't know if this is possible.

Sorry to mess up your poll...

Just another thought - since it is likely that this freezing issue only really came to light after the August release date, after reports of problems started to come in, it is unlikely that any hardware changes will have been made before then. Perhaps your current poll is valid on the assumption that all machines before August 7th are "equal"?

Cheers,
Craig.

You didn't mess up my poll. I did.

Not that it matters if no one votes on it anyway but since it is now as flawed as this one is I would delete it if I could. I don't think anyone but a moderator can do that though. I'll just leave it to die.

I wasn't making any assumptions at all. I have a non-freezing iMac that has given me no major problems thus far at all. I am only interested in helping those that do have problems as much as I can.

Actually my BEST advice to all those affected is still what I would do myself if I were in their shoes: RETURN the iMac for a repair or replacement under warranty.

There is no way I would sit around and wait for Apple to issue software fixes.