Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Mac Pro (Late 2013) GPU (Driver) Issues

What do you think is the source of the graphics issues on Mac Pro (Late 2013) ?

  • Hardware

    Votes: 69 53.1%

  • Software

    Votes: 28 21.5%

  • Hardware & Software

    Votes: 32 24.6%

  • Other

    Votes: 1 0.8%
  • Total voters
    130
Infrared said:
If they're running this under sustained load for days, could that not shorten the lifespan of the machine?

Whether or not that is the case, the user still ends up with a refurb but without getting the refurb discount.

I think, for a newish machine (up to say 6 months or so), they should replace it without hesitation. These things should work right out of the box.
Click to expand...

If they actually did stress test the machine for days, then I'd agree with you. My experience was that the diagnostic tests didn't replicate the problems because it was clear they didn't run them for that long. It was only when the display errors happened right in front of them while I was there that I got a GPU replacement. Subsequent to that, when the coil whine problem developed, it was having a recording of the noise that did the trick in getting them to replace the whole machine since they couldn't reproduce it themselves either.

The point is that Apple in fact does do the right thing once the problem is identified (replaced hardware, replaced machines), but the diagnostic processes at the Genius bar don't work well, particularly for the nMP. Also nMP users are too quick to blame software bugs for intermittent hardware issues and because they're using these professionally, there's a legitimate concern about being without one's machine for a week.
 
First, about getting new machine from Apple:

- You have 14 days to return machine if you have problems or you are not satisfied, but only if you bought machine from Apple Retail or if you bought it from Apple Online store. That is guaranteed. After 14 days, machine goes to Genius for solution or directly to service depending on problem.

- If you bought machine from Apple Authorized Reseller, that is completely different story.
https://www.apple.com/legal/sales-support/sales-policies/reseller.html
As you can read here, every reseller can have their own policy.

Anyhow, I bought machine in another country (cca 400km away from me now), and when problems started....try this and that, wait for 10.10.3....time passed. So I do not have any other solutions other than Authorized Service, and they all have the same policy...they must fix your machine.

To provoke this problem, you do not have to do anything special....and guys from Authorized Service offered me to test machine myself for a few days when they change first GPU. So my machine will not be turtured.
 
Last edited:
VirtualRain said:
My system with dual 4K monitors would KP often on 10.10.2 and has been back to normal on 10.10.3 beta.
Click to expand...

Seems to be fixed in 10.10.3 for me as well - so far only about 4? resumes as I have been traveling but usually it did some sort of ****up half the time if not more.

Oh well, at least I got the nMP's fan fixed when I had it sit 3 weeks being 'repaired' ('no issues found except whiny fan').
 
damezumari said:
Seems to be fixed in 10.10.3 for me as well - so far only about 4? resumes as I have been traveling but usually it did some sort of ****up half the time if not more.
Click to expand...

False alarm here, unfortunately. After few (perhaps week's worth?) of daily resumes, I got GPU reset loop this morning. At least no kernel panic, but sigh..
 
damezumari said:
False alarm here, unfortunately. After few (perhaps week's worth?) of daily resumes, I got GPU reset loop this morning. At least no kernel panic, but sigh..
Click to expand...

Unfortunately, this can be such an occasional/intermittent issue that one must allow a long time to elapse before tentatively concluding it has be cured. Even then, you will never know for sure: if everything is fine at day N there is always a chance that the machine will misbehave at day N+1. Randomly trying things and waiting is a weak diagnostic approach, but unfortunately there does not seem to be a better one that I am aware of.

I had offered to let Apple remotely log onto the machine when the fault was occurring, to catch it in the act so to speak and perhaps diagnose what was happening. I had found that during these lockups ssh access is still possible. Apple were not inclined to do that. They do have a diagnostic tool they can use, but, alas, it has a GUI interface - not helpful if it's the GUI that is frozen!

Regarding my own situation:

After a lengthy process of trying to eliminate software issues, there remained nothing obvious left to try that could plausibly eliminate the fault. I had tried various things, such as removing 3rd party software, using different OS versions and finally I resorted to a complete reinstall without any extra software and contented myself with just using Safari. Things were fine for a few days and then the machine locked up.

Fortunately - and I had to be persistent - the retailer offered to replace the machine and I am grateful for that. I do hope the problem will not reoccur with this new machine. I have used it for a few hours and no problems thus far, but it is early days yet so I don't want to raise my hopes too far.

At some point I may try comparing the saved copy of the logs from my old machine with the logs from the new one, to see if there are any interesting differences between the two.

I will keep you updated on how things go. To those that still have the issue, I wish you the best of luck (hopefully not too much luck needed!) and, please, let us know how you are getting on. The more information we collectively have, the greater the chance of identifying any shared factors linked to a possible fault.

Thanks.
 
I've been fighting with this issue for the last few weeks and wow is it frustrating. It is currently with Apple getting the second graphics card replacement but I'm not optimistic. AppleCare had no idea on the phone and when I took it to the Apple store the way the kids eyes glazed over when explaining the problem and then looking at the logs I have 0 confidence that they have any clue what they are doing.
 
WordMasterRice said:
I've been fighting with this issue for the last few weeks and wow is it frustrating. It is currently with Apple getting the second graphics card replacement but I'm not optimistic. AppleCare had no idea on the phone and when I took it to the Apple store the way the kids eyes glazed over when explaining the problem and then looking at the logs I have 0 confidence that they have any clue what they are doing.
Click to expand...

It looks just like that, they have no idea:
1 - Change GPU-B
2 - Change GPU-A
3 - Change both GPUs
4 - PSU
5 - Other electronics

So this is either some kind of hardware incompatibility (between GPUs and GPUs and logic board) or some kind of hardware imperfection which manifests itself in this manner: random freezing. I just do not know, but unfortunately Apple does not either.
 
bax2003 said:
It looks just like that, they have no idea:
1 - Change GPU-B
2 - Change GPU-A
3 - Change both GPUs
4 - PSU
5 - Other electronics

So this is either some kind of hardware incompatibility (between GPUs and GPUs and logic board) or some kind of hardware imperfection which manifests itself in this manner: random freezing. I just do not know, but unfortunately Apple does not either.
Click to expand...

Has anyone actually had this problem fixed yet? Obviously I don't expect it to come back to me fixed but will anything fix it short of a replacement?
 
WordMasterRice said:
Has anyone actually had this problem fixed yet? Obviously I don't expect it to come back to me fixed but will anything fix it short of a replacement?
Click to expand...

One by one Apple will change all components inside Mac Pro and that will be fix. I just hope that they will eventually find out what the problems is, so that this never happens in future hardware revisions.

There is one case from my Authorized Service Provider which is resolved at the end by changing both GPUs and logic board.
 
bax2003 said:
One by one Apple will change all components inside Mac Pro and that will be fix. I just hope that they will eventually find out what the problems is, so that this never happens in future hardware revisions.

There is one case from my Authorized Service Provider which is resolved at the end by changing both GPUs and logic board.
Click to expand...

Alright well I've spent 500 miles and 10 hours driving back and for waiting for days only to have the same problem. I might just buy something that actually works.
 
WordMasterRice said:
Alright well I've spent 500 miles and 10 hours driving back and for waiting for days only to have the same problem. I might just buy something that actually works.
Click to expand...

If you reported issue to Apple within 14 days after purchase, they should give you new machine. Unfortunately I lost too much time diagnosing this myself.

There is nowhere on the internet topic like this, where this much people have gathered around this issue. Why did I have to be topic creator :( ;)
 
bax2003 said:
If you reported issue to Apple within 14 days after purchase, they should give you new machine. Unfortunately I lost too much time diagnosing this myself.

There is nowhere on the internet topic like this, where this much people have gathered around this issue. Why did I have to be topic creator ;)
Click to expand...

Tell me about it, I spent about a month figuring out exactly what was up. I never found any more info either, this is the first thread I've stumbled across that is the exact issue I've had.
 
Mac Pro (Late 2013) GPU (Driver) Issues

WordMasterRice said:
Tell me about it, I spent about a month figuring out exactly what was up. I never found any more info either, this is the first thread I've stumbled across that is the exact issue I've had.
Click to expand...


I think are one or two small threads over at Apple's discussion forums, but I have to say not very many people affected posting there. E.g.:

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/6439490

The replacement here has not frozen yet, so a few molecules of hope are circulating in the air. Still too early to be confident, though.
 
I just got word from Authorised Service. They changed GPU-B, so I am going to pick i t up and test it. They change GPU-B firstly because it has PCIe Flash storage connector on one side. Apple's procedure.

I'll keep you posted...
 
Just got mine back today with the second card replaced, so I have 2 brand new GPUs. We shall see how it goes but I'm not terribly hopeful.

Anyone with multiple monitors, has anyone gotten monitors to register to different graphics cards? I can only get my monitors to register to the GPU in Slot 2, nothing I do gets anything registered to slot 1.
 
WordMasterRice said:
Just got mine back today with the second card replaced, so I have 2 brand new GPUs. We shall see how it goes but I'm not terribly hopeful.



Anyone with multiple monitors, has anyone gotten monitors to register to different graphics cards? I can only get my monitors to register to the GPU in Slot 2, nothing I do gets anything registered to slot 1.
Click to expand...


All displays are physically connected to the GPU in slot 2. The other GPU is reserved exclusively for compute tasks.
 
WordMasterRice said:
Good info, thanks. I couldn't seem to find that anywhere.
Click to expand...

bax2003 said:
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1859534/

I am currently testing my Mac Pro with replaced GPU-B (2)....fingers crossed.

EDIT: No problems after 6 hours...
Click to expand...

ItIqxDY.png
 
From "System Information" on the replacement machine:

AMD FirePro D300:

Chipset Model: AMD FirePro D300
Type: GPU
Bus: PCIe
Slot: Slot-1
PCIe Lane Width: x16
VRAM (Total): 2048 MB
Vendor: ATI (0x1002)
Device ID: 0x6810
Revision ID: 0x0000
ROM Revision: 113-C4012F-687
gMux Version: 4.0.11 [3.2.8]
EFI Driver Version: 01.00.687

The other card has the same details, apart from slot number.
 
AMD FirePro D300: (changed GPU)

Chipset Model: AMD FirePro D300
Type: GPU
Bus: PCIe
Slot: Slot-2
PCIe Lane Width: x16
VRAM (Total): 2048 MB
Vendor: ATI (0x1002)
Device ID: 0x6810
Revision ID: 0x0000
ROM Revision: 113-C4012F-687
gMux Version: 4.0.11 [3.2.8]
EFI Driver Version: 01.00.687

EDIT: No problems after 24 hours...
 
So far so good for me as well. My problems came up primarily when I had some sort of video playing, youtube or something like that. I've had videos playing non-stop since I got it back to verify.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back