(2014-06-11) Mac Book Pro Dying

I fear my MacBook Pro is Dying. In the middle of a Google Chrome session, the video went haywire, froze, then the Mac started a series of 3-beeps.

A couple restarts seemed OK for a few seconds, but then the same thing would happen.

Ran Apple Hardware Test test, regular and Extended, found No Problem. Screen was fuzzy the whole time.

Did the SMC and PRAM resets. If anything, this made it worse, get frozen white screen at end of boot-up. And at start of boot up, the Apple logo is green.

Of course my Time Capsule has been hinky, so haven't had recent Back Up.

Thurs: Do FireWire-boot from older IMac (FireWire logo is nice and crisp on screen), copy some documents over, though no ThunderBird archives or recent music purchases...

• later copy all documents over, except for the ITunes stuff.

Boot in Safe mode. After progress bar, comes up with fat bright yellow green vertical bars. But no alerts.

At this point booting in regular mode goes from green logo to solid white screen...

Jun14 update: took to Apple Store to take a look. They're sending it to repair center. Just 8 days out of 3-yr period! But/so they decided to honor the warranty, so no cost to me!

Jun17: got msg it's ready

Jun19: go pickup. Yes got new logic board. They almost charged me, but I had him check the notes, and got comped!

Jun20: whoa screen just turned to grey pinstripes in middle of Chrome stuff! Seems OK post-reboot... Nope, definitely hosed.

Jun21: take it back to Apple Store

Jun26: get call, it has come back. They replaced the logic board again, plus the hard drive, the Mag Safe Board, and the "Bracket Top Case Front". They ask if I want them to do a 24hr burn-test at the store before I pick up, so I say yes.

Jun27: pick it up, bring it home. Yes, it's a new drive so totally wiped. They re-installed the same MacOs X 10.6.8, so I'm going to leave that alone. I guess I'll restore from the Time Machine Back Up.

• grr realize the Time Capsule is totally dead. Un/re-plug does nothing, just sits there.
• I don't suppose I can go around this problem by connecting the IOmega directly to the MacBook Pro?
  • it mounts, asks if I want to use it for Time Capsule backups, I say "Decide Later". See there's a 175GB *.sparsebundle file on the drive
  • but if I select "Browse Other Time Machine Disks" menu, the popup select-window doesn't show any entries.
• start Chat with Apple Support. They have me find original Install DVD, boot from that, pick "Restore from Time Machine Backup" from Utilities window (while IOmega is still attached), it gives me list of backups stored, I pick latest (argh from Jun02) to restore from... says it will take 6hrs.
• update: it worked

Jul01: finally get around to merging my post-Time Capsule Back Up bits onto the machine. Everything is up and running now.

Sept07: omg it's doing it again! Fresh Back Up, fresh manual docs copies to IMac, appointment made....

• They actually replaced it with a brand new Retina machine at no charge! You betcha I paid $350 for Apple Care!

Feb'2015: not everyone is so lucky. This defect has drawn the attention of law firm Whitfield Bryson & Mason LLP, which has taken up the case and is pursuing a lawsuit against Apple.