Confusion about the exact age of my 17" pre-unibody MacBook Pro

[Baldung99]

OK so this thing has hand a ride. The original owner dropped it, then had a fight over it during which the screen bezel broke (near the hinges) but the panel miraculously survived. Then I managed to drop a fire extinguisher on it... and the thing just refuses to die! I found a water damaged early-2008 17" MBP and dropped my motherboard right in. Aside from buzzing fans, it's fine.

Anyway.

What I'm confused about is, there seems to be a mismatch between the serial reported by the OS and what everymac says this thing should be. When looking up the serial number (W88100EBYP4) on everymac, it comes up as a "built to order" early-2008 model, with a 2.6GHz "Penryn" Core 2 Duo and a GeForce 8600M GT with 512MB of VRAM. But the thing is, while the one I've got has 512MB of VRAM, it's got the 2.5GHz T9300 - not bad by any means, just, not the T9500.

Who's wrong here, me or everymac?

EDIT: well it appears I got one that had its board replaced! Green dot and all. Which would explain why this 17-inched doesn't yet have any GPU issues.

 

[Amethyst1]

Does the serial on the RAM slot match the one reported in the OS? Does the RAM slot have the green dot indicating the logic board was replaced due to the GPU issues? If so, they might (accidentally) have used a 2.5 GHz part and burned your old board's serial number onto it.

 

[B S Magnet]

OK so this thing has hand a ride. The original owner dropped it, then had a fight over it during which the screen bezel broke (near the hinges) but the panel miraculously survived. Then I managed to drop a fire extinguisher on it... and the thing just refuses to die! I found a water damaged early-2008 17" MBP and dropped my motherboard right in. Aside from buzzing fans, it's fine.

Anyway.

What I'm confused about is, there seems to be a mismatch between the serial reported by the OS and what everymac says this thing should be. When looking up the serial number (W88100EBYP4) on everymac, it comes up as a "built to order" early-2008 model, with a 2.6GHz "Penryn" Core 2 Duo and a GeForce 8600M GT with 512MB of VRAM. But the thing is, while the one I've got has 512MB of VRAM, it's got the 2.5GHz T9300 - not bad by any means, just, not the T9500.

Who's wrong here, me or everymac?

I’m having a look here on Appleserialnumberinfo at your serial, and to my surprise, it doesn’t specify whether it shipped with the 2.5 or 2.6GHz CPU:

The place where you want to check on this 17-inch as to what the original serial number was/is, is under the battery, along the grey label which features the Ethernet MAC ID, product serial, and shorthand for configuration. From an iFixit guide photo, I’ve put a bright blue rectangle over the location of this OEM label:

This grey label will also denote which CPU was shipped originally — whether 2.5 or 2.6.

Underneath the RAM door, there will also be a serial number on the RAM bridge, like @Amethyst1 described.

This serial number is specific to the logic board itself and won’t align with the actual Mac serial (which is what the grey label is for). To wit, the 17-inch A1261 MacBook Pro on which I’m typing came with this serial on the grey label, but the OEM board serial (the board had the bad GPU issue and is no longer being used) was W881203PP22BA — close, but not the same. Following that board serial number on the RAM bridge is, however, an internal production shorthand of whether that board has the 2.5 or 2.6GHz chip (in my OEM board’s case, that was “M88 PVT2.5GHYU512M”).

Hopefully this will clear up some confusion. If not, let us know.

 

[Baldung99]

Does the serial on the RAM slot match the one reported in the OS? Does the RAM slot have the green dot indicating the logic board was replaced due to the GPU issues? If so, they might (accidentally) have used a 2.5 GHz part and burned your old board's serial number onto it.

That appears to be exactly what's the case here! It has a giant green dot and a different serial on a sticker on the RAM sockets.

it's just funny that I never even noticed this, despite the mobo having to move chassis a couple times...

 

[Baldung99]

I’m having a look here on Appleserialnumberinfo at your serial, and to my surprise, it doesn’t specify whether it shipped with the 2.5 or 2.6GHz CPU:

I didn't even know this site existed, thanks!

Hopefully this will clear up some confusion. If not, let us know.

oh it did clear up all the confusion

 

[Amethyst1]

That appears to be exactly what's the case here! It has a giant green dot and a different serial on a sticker on the RAM sockets.

I have two MBPs (15" 2007 and 17" 2007) that have the green dot, and funnily, both machines have a replacement logic board that was built earlier than the original one.