formating my mac

Hey everyone,

I have a huge problem with my 3year old mac book pro!
so i access my windows partition on my mac and suddenly it went crazy, the image started distorting and frooze. I reboot and go into my mac partition and the same thing happened on my OSX...I figured I got a virus or a worm of some kind, time to format! So I format BOTH partitions and I still have the same problem, the computer freezes before i can finish installing osx. anyone know wth this is or is there a way to hook up my mac bookpro to another computer and format it through an exterior source?

thank you,
Marcel

If it's happening in more than one OS, chances are it's not any kind of malware.

You didn't mention what model your machine is, but most likely, your MacBook Pro is one of the older models equipped with the NVIDIA 8600m GPU. Certain 8600-series chips could operate abnormally and Apple extended the warranty for these systems:

MacBook Pro: Distorted video or no video issues

cwa107 said:

If it's happening in more than one OS, chances are it's not any kind of malware.

You didn't mention what model your machine is, but most likely, your MacBook Pro is one of the older models equipped with the NVIDIA 8600m GPU. Certain 8600-series chips could operate abnormally and Apple extended the warranty for these systems:

MacBook Pro: Distorted video or no video issues

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nop its not an nvidia its an ati.

my model is a intel 15" 2.4ghz w 2gigs ram with some sort of ati graphic card, it was the last model before apple started using nvidia on there models

nucleor_mm said:

nop its not an nvidia its an ati.

my model is a intel 15" 2.4ghz w 2gigs ram with some sort of ati graphic card, it was the last model before apple started using nvidia on there models

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Core Duo or Core 2 Duo?

cwa107 said:

Core Duo or Core 2 Duo?

Click to expand...

core 2 duo

nucleor_mm said:

core 2 duo

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Are you positive it's a 2.4 then? I only ask because that clockspeed in particular seems put of line for the ATI-equipped machines.

cwa107 said:

Are you positive it's a 2.4 then? I only ask because that clockspeed in particular seems put of line for the ATI-equipped machines.

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your right its a 2.16ghz

Apple MACBOOK PRO 2.16 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo Processor 2 GB RAM 120 GB hard drive Superdrive 15.4-inch Model No: A1211

sounds like a hardware issue to me so wether it will help much is a moot point.
However you can easily enough hook the machine up to another Mac by connecting it via a firewire cable and turning it on while holding down T for target disk mode, it will show up on the desktop or under disk utility on the other machine.

You can also format the disk by selecting Disk Utility from one of the menus on the very first couple of screens when booting from the an OSX install disk.

nucleor_mm said:

your right its a 2.16ghz

Apple MACBOOK PRO 2.16 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo Processor 2 GB RAM 120 GB hard drive Superdrive 15.4-inch Model No: A1211

Click to expand...

OK, yep - that was the last revision before they went over to NVIDIA. In my opinion, it sounds like an overheating GPU. Especially if it starts OK, but by the time it gets up to operating temperature, the video starts to distort.

Most likely one of your fans isn't working right. It might just need to be cleaned out, or it might need to be replaced altogether.

How handy are you with disassembling laptops?