Hacker News Reader

Comment by abakker | Hacker News Reader

FWIW, I did this with a 2011 MacBook pro 17" 7 times, and it worked every time. Each time it worked for about 3 months, and then the video card would glitch out again. Finally, apple did a warrantee extension on that logic board and replaced it.

Just my 2¢ to say that it does work sometimes.

View on HN

I did this 3 times with a HP laptop from 2010-2011 and had the same experience, the graphics chip would last 3-4 more months.

My understanding was that the oven repair was/is mostly for when GPU’s had to move away from less based solder due to EU regulations but hadn’t gotten non-lead based solder right yet.

Also I wrapped most of the board in foil only exposing the GPU, and I put the board in hot and then killed heat after one or two minutes.

I thought it was great as a kid without any means to a new computer. Friends would give me their broken computers and I would fix them for myself.

The right repair I guess depends on what you can afford and what you’re willing to risk.

If you had to do it 7 times, that doesn’t really sound like it “worked”.

Well, it took a non-working laptop - video glitched and unusable, to one that was working for 3 months. Was it a permanent fix? No. But, it sure beat buying a new laptop on short notice.

Sounds like my home theater amplifier (Pioneer VSX-921). The audio DSP chip gets too hot during normal use and desolders itself ever so slightly, which gives the error UE22. Someone figured out that taking a hot air gun to the chip fixes it, but I had to re-apply the fix about every three months.

What angered me even more was that Pioneer USA acknowledged the problem and would either repair or give you a replacement model, but Pioneer EU pretends everything is fine and dandy, even when you point them to Pioneer USA its stance.

Would a fan help?

No idea, I gave it away for free to a solder-handy guy who was unemployed and needed something to drive a 5.1 set he was gifted from someone else. I did try a heatsink, but that didn't help noticeably.

There's nothing that the folks who are willing to pay for home theater audio gear love more than adding an acoustical noise source.

Usually it's not the chips actually desoldering so much as it is thermal cycling causing the solder joints to crack. Most ICs can't really survive being heated to solder melt temperature for an extended period.

Either way, it's pretty bad that they didn't do something about it. That's indicative of a pretty serious manufacturing or design flaw.

It sounds like it did work, the problem is faulty solder.

There's likely nothing wrong with the solder, but with the lack of flux.

Its Monday, I think there is a widespread lack of flux today.

this man speaks a good point

They replaced your logic board under warranty after you'd baked it 7 times?

It was a special repair extension program that they only put in place 2 years after the original warrantee+Applecare timeframe ended.

There is a water damage sensor, but not a put in oven sensor ;)

If there was it likely wouldn't make it out of the factory haha

This is not an issue that putting in the oven is going to resolve. It's an issue with the die of the GPU. By introducing heat stress to the die it may be "functional" for a short period, but it is not a fix. This fallacy has existed for decades and was most prevalent in the Xbox 360 days. This is why the "towel method" was said to work, but was never a permanent solution.

I have that same 2011, and had been using it headless as a third machine with VNC. A recent bad update screwed it up, and I was going to call it quits but then found two work arounds.

Temporary (actually fairly permanent, but if the laptop goes to sleep you run into the backlight problem where it won't turn on until you poweroff the laptop and then back on again)

https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=765954#c65

Permanent

https://realmacmods.com/macbook-2011-radeon-gpu-disable/

Between 2011 and 2013 Apple had a repair extension program for video issues. This is how they fixed them: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XaGHcBZjmWA

I have a 2013 MacBook pro that just dies at random times. I could never get them to confirm that this specific year had issues.

But I have always suspected that it was something with the board and poor solder connections.

https://www.apple.com/support/exchange_repair/ - looks like a battery and SSD program currently on that laptop. Maybe check in?

Unfortunately those two related items are for 2016-2018 models

I did the same with my 2008 MBP 15" and it worked, for a while. I then lent it to a friend who had it when the fix stopped working - he figured out that another solution was to simply wrap i in towels and turn it on and leave it like that for a while - it got hot enough to reflow itself!

No it didnt, Solder melts at >200C. Its bad nvidia gpu die bonding, heating it up to ~100 softens the glue and relieves stresses temporarily.

Im amazed there are CS people on HN not knowing basic physics.

Not sure whether to upvote for useful information or downvote due to the unnecessary insult tacked on the end. :/

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=w57ObM3pYXw

I believe this is the one that explains it. Or the one before it. The reflow over time goes back to how it was, if it works at all.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com