MBP Late 2011 boot problems

[TammyP]

My MacBookPro 17Inch is late 2011

After much trouble with previous drive only booting as far as login, I decided to upgrade to a Samsung 500Gb SSD.
Did a fresh install of Lion then upgraded to ElCapitan.
All was well, for a few days, when I started getting the same problem, only going as far as login then Gray screen.
I then replaced the sata cable for the drive as I read that this can breakdown sometimes.
All was well for a few day then the same problem as before.
So I then cleaned the drive with disk utility and installed ElCapitan from USB.
Still no improvement.
It works for a few bootups then stalls.
Any advice appreciated

 

[chscag]

Welcome to our forums.

Sorry about the late reply....

Your particular model MacBook Pro is susceptible to graphics card failure. Apple had a special repair program for that model but it's long over. And since Apple considers that model to be vintage, they won't even look at it. However, you can probably take it to an independent Mac repair shop to see what they say and what the possible cost is to repair it.

 

[TammyP]

Is there any way of testing (ie Proving) its the graphics card after I do a clean install

 

[chscag]

Since you're running El Capitan, boot the machine to recovery (Command + R as soon as you hear the boot chime). Once in Recovery, choose Utilities, Disk Utility. Then run a check on your Samsung SSD. The SSD is probably okay since it's new but you should check it anyway.

To check the graphics card you can run the Apple Hardware Test.

Your MacBook Pro actually has two graphic chipsets: One is an Intel HD 3000 (integrated) and the other is an AMD Radeon (discrete). It's usually the AMD Radeon which fails.

 

[TammyP]

I did as you suggested and the quick test returned no errors
The longer test however returned the following
apple hardware test has detected error 4MEM/65/40000000: 0x84d2ed98
Would I be right in assuming this is a Ram issue ?
I am currently retesting the MBP with one stick of Ram at a time to see if I can find the fault
Will post results soon

 

[chscag]

It does look like the hardware test indicates a memory error. Your machine can actually take up to 16GB of memory not the original that Apple states. Let us know.

 

[TammyP]

I tested the two sticks of 8GB Ram using the long test.
I first tried one stick in the bottom slot, then again in the second slot
I then did the same with the other stick.
No errors
Put the two sticks in and did another full test
No errors !!
I have now wiped the drive and reinstalled ElCapitan so I will see how that goes.

 

[TammyP]

All seems well so I thank you for your help

 

[chscag]

Okay. Thanks for posting back. Be sure to keep your backups current, just in case.