looks like works with the MacBook SMC Firmware Update v1.1
Filed in: Random Shutdown Add comments
Today i download the firmware and the sound of the MB working change (its more silent)..also i guess run fast…
After that, i download the fan controller too.
My first test for my MB was at you tube (most of the time when i try to watch any video there..appears the rss)…ok
2nd was have open 4 programs at the same time (yahoo messenger, iweb, safari, and word)…was ok
3rd was with the 4 programs open also run at the same time the rss test software…the temperature reach the 183 F…and…nothing…no rss.
tonigh i will make more tests with photoshop and iphoto, that in my case increase the rss..
for me its working…at least for now..
October 27th, 2006 at 7:35 pm
My black MacBook week 23 began RSD one moth after purchase. I calld Apple and they gave me a case number, but I didn’t send for service because early repairs get RSD again.
I installed the SMC firmware 1.4f12 yesterday October 26, and I haven’t had no more RSD, even with crash test yes >/dev/null &. Although it is soon to consider it an ultimate fix (if some wire isolation is melted by heat, no firmware update will fix it) if RSD are avoided by ignoring the erratic temperature sensor data that suposedly the wire defect caused, well, it’s a big step ahead.
Anyway, let’s see if this works for all the affected, mine was not one of the worst cases, some users claim to have had RSD after this firmware update, so let’s wait and see
October 27th, 2006 at 9:10 pm
I think we can say that the RSD problem is solved. I have a MacBook and never had the RSD problem (btw.. my name is Dutch)
October 27th, 2006 at 11:33 pm
The firmware has so far fixed my problem. I had RSS all the time. When I went to install it, I was entertained by the statement that I shouldn’t shutoff the computer during the firmware upgrade to stop the computer from shutting off randomly.. I’m like: It’s not in my control!
October 28th, 2006 at 12:16 am
My Macbook had been experiencing RSD for over 6 weeks – to the point where it would shutdown within 10 minutes of every start up.
I installed the SMC firmware update this morning, and it’s run now for 7 1/2 hours without a problem, at 2GHz and with almost no fan noise.
I think the firmware update has solved the problem.. although how is another question.
October 28th, 2006 at 4:43 am
I left Apple five years ago for one reason: they don’t give a crap about their customers and the prices for their “art-work” are insane. I changed to Linux and I’ll admit it can be pretty buggy, but it has yet to turn off randomly. I grew up with Apple IIE and I loved it as a kid, but the company has moved away from a useful, intuitive system design to elitist artistic paperwieghts. Not my cup of tea. Apple left its users to the forums–that’s great customer support! This website is another example how Apple left it’s users high-and-dry. You get better support (free) using Fedora Core. I hope hard-core Apple users get the message…a kick in the pants is a kick in the pants.
October 28th, 2006 at 12:14 pm
Mark, can you do photoshop or Illustrator in Linux? Perhaps you can using CrossOver, but it cost more money and big slowdown.
Linux support power is also in user base, you can ask someone in FC dev mailing list, and get the answer fast. Maybe it resolve the problem maybe it wont. in Linux you get answer, but when comes to drivers update or software update, Linux User is relying on the Dev’s which they are doing it for free mostly.
You can not go to Linux Care to fix up your broken hardware, no?
There are no Linux care, Linux is don’t even have a warranty.
October 28th, 2006 at 3:58 pm
I bout a MacBook on June 24, 2006 and I am using it for scientific as well as personal use, I never faced the problem of RSD, Now I doubt whether I have to install the firmware update for
RSD as a precaution.
I am a first time Mac user and I am completely satisfied!
Poker
October 28th, 2006 at 7:02 pm
Do you think by end of november all this will be solved cuz thats when im buying one. and i dont want to deal with all this. Macs are supposed to be simple and “just work” atleast my pc stays on…
October 29th, 2006 at 12:20 am
No this patch DID NOT FIX MINE!!!! dont expect it to work on everyones because it may have fixed some. Mine does not work.
October 29th, 2006 at 1:25 am
keep the comments coming, this is great to know if the Firmware fix has worked for anyone!
Cheers!
Matthew
October 29th, 2006 at 1:55 am
My RSD was fixed with this firmware. Before that, my RSD had get to a stage so bad that it just shutdown while it is booting. For those who didn’t manage to get it work, have u installed the 10.4.8 update before the smc firmware1.1???
I had get it updated 2 days ago and not problem since them. Install duocoretemp to monitor the temp and clockspeed. No shutdown since the update and the temp n clockspeed seems ok.
I hope that the real cause of this problem is not hardware related. I had visited the Apple Care Center before the update was out. They told me it was the heatsink problem. if it is so, then firmware can’t repair it. I am just curious what the frmware does to my system.
October 29th, 2006 at 2:08 am
My macbook start this problem about month ago. I dont use waranty support, becouse i dont believe, that mainboard replacement will fix problem, its 50/50 – maybee works, maybee not. And that bullshit about wires – did apple say that??? This problem is in incorrect intell thermall sensors or something like that, IT IS NOT PHISICAL ISSUE!!! Problem is in firmvare + intell sensors… And now after update mine works perfectly – if someone still hawe this problem, its something else, not random shutdown, btw some iMacs, iBooks too hawe something like MRS, becouse macos is full of shit from third party software. And stop this silly rumors about wires, thermal compound, hot sinc – since apple officialy does not post anything about that its all bla bla bla…
And why all you need to know about what is the problem, its service and support job!!! Maybe its been too long till they(apple) fix this, but they fix! Ok if someone think that Microsoft machines is better – go back and take 100 stupid unuseable updates per day – its soo cool, wow…
October 29th, 2006 at 3:09 am
My macbook still have rss after replaced the mainboard 1 months ago and have RSS problem again! Now my macbook’s problem finally fixed after applying the firmware patch.
October 29th, 2006 at 3:17 am
For the record, I’ve replaced dozens of heatsinks/logic boards on MacBooks – I’ve NEVER seen any melted wires or anything like that on the old heatsinks…
I can tell you that the connectors on the new ones are a different color and then there’s a pressure sponge that you put over the sensor connectors to keep them on…
October 29th, 2006 at 3:35 am
So what now? update firmware or not? ive got my logic board and heatsink replaced almost a month ago and no RSS ever since…should i upgrade the firmware or not…im afraid to do so since my macbook is running great again…
October 29th, 2006 at 4:07 am
After 48 hours…my MB looks great…was on for a 40 hours: opening and closing diferent program also the iphoto that before cause the rss.
Im thinking the same as Wlliam Lee: curious what the firmware does to my system.
how its possible that any software fix an hardware problem?
After months having the rss…im really want to know what the firmware do
do someone know if the MB have two fans?..cos i guess i always hear one working slow…and i not hear another or the same working fast like before.
The apple fix was smart, its diferent make a recall for 5000 Macbooks and change hardware parts than create an updated..dont u think?…
remember all, that in my case i did not go to the applecare to change the logic board and the heatsink…i still have my original hardware…
if someone take a look to the flickr pictures of the logicboard
http://www.flickr.com/photos/99055354@N00/271937310/
can notice that rss logicboard have an diferent color from the shortcut of the rss…i guess mine it like like that…so…i will buy the 3 years guarantee just in case in the near future needs logicboard replace.
October 29th, 2006 at 5:59 am
The update SEEMS to have fixed my MacBook. I downloaded yesterday,
Before that – even with screech of death – the thing closed down after about 10 minutes. After the initial RSD I usually have a few hours to do stuff as long as I don’t shut the screen down.
NOW I can start it up normally, close the book and open it again without RSD. 2nd day of use with the update and NO RSD. Very encouraging. Not sure how it works but it does.
But for how long??!
October 29th, 2006 at 6:40 am
Whenever I start up my MacBook I still get a screen of stripes, I have to reset the PVRAM to be able to boot normally. Is there any sollution to that problem?
October 29th, 2006 at 12:20 pm
I bought a week 38 MacBook (1.83Ghz with upgraded 1GB RAM). I havent used it that much (only on 8th battery cycle) and never had the RSD problem.
My question is: does this firmware update keep the fans on for longer and if so does this reduce the battery life or does it do something completely different?
I’m reluctant to install it if this is the case but then again I dont want any melted wires (if that actually occurs at all).
Many thanks
Ronan
October 29th, 2006 at 1:14 pm
I have a week 36 and a week 38 MacBook (both 1.83ghz, one 512mb, the other 1gb RAM). So far I haven’t had any RSD issues even with extreme CPU usage (video encoding, computationally intensive software under development, etc.). In fact, I’ve seen the temperature rise up to 85 degrees celcius on both machines. I’ve applied this update and haven’t noticed anything significantly different.
To Ronan, I’d say might as well do the updated firmware. I’d say to trust the actual hardware developers/manufacturers, than some people who assume they know better. While we can’t totally trust Apple on this, it’s better than trusting some posting that we have no real way of verifying who is posting, and what their intentions are.
October 29th, 2006 at 1:38 pm
FINALLY! I’ve had my white 2.0 ghz macbook for several months now (I don’t know what week etc..) but I started having these shutdowns about a month after I got it. My shutdowns seemed different from the others reported, in that, it would shutdown within 2 minutes of startup and once that happened I had to do a hard boot (hold power down for few secs, watch light blink..). That would work, but then the fans would run full speed for hours. Very annoying and disheartening. I installed this patch and…… flawless operaton. It rebooted, no fan noise nothing.. I closed the lid, and opened it, and wow, it actually started up. Previously anytime I shut the lid, it would attempt to start up but die within 2 seconds.
Looks like the SMC fixed it…
October 29th, 2006 at 1:45 pm
Oh, just one more note.
To all those people that think apple doesn’t care.. Here’s a thought
Many of you I’m sure work in the corporate world, as I do. You know that anytime you have an issue with your product or service, you spend a lot of time evaluating the impact of the issue on your customer base. Based on that information, you then make a decision on whether to make a public announcement, or quietly fix the issue. As we’ve seen from Apple in the past, they are very very sensitive to the press. I was imagining how many times this issues was brought up in weekly tech meetings, then management meeting, then senior management meetings, then Exec meetings… I we had insight into how much internal visibility this issue ACTUALLY had, I think we’d all be somewhat suprised….
If they would have press-released an announcement regarding this issue prior to a fix, it would have been crushing to their sales of macbooks. Now, what sense would that make on any level. By creating a fix and not broadcasting the issue, the affected customers problems are solved and the issue quietly goes away.
All these comments about how Apple doesn’t care about it’s customers are simply way off base. I mean no offense by these statements, just my observations…
October 29th, 2006 at 2:08 pm
You just said yourself; they didn’t keep this quiet because they cared about their customers, they did it because a public announcement “would have been crushing to the sales of their macbooks.” I couldn’t care less about their sales when they sold me a broken computer. But regardless, I’ve dealt with RSS for the past 2 months assuming exactly what you said – that Apple really really does not want to annouce this problem, but is nevertheless working hard to develop a fix, since it is in their best interest for this to go away. Now that the fix is here, assuming that it is a completely legitimate fix (which I think it is), I cannot say that I blame Apple for the way it handled all of this. But there are a lot of people who were reallt fuc*ed over, espescially those that went through one or two hardware replacements. I don’t care what it will do to your sales, you shouldn’t treat customers like that.
October 29th, 2006 at 2:30 pm
Pete, are you from APPLE.
October 29th, 2006 at 2:57 pm
First, I’m not from Apple. I work for a very large financial firm. Secondly, let me restate my opinion of Apple’s concern for their customers. Apple’s care is for their customer’s is for their return business. That’s all. Do they personally care if anyone of us get’s fcked? Ha! Of course not. But I challenge you to find any hw/sw manufacturer that does. I am simply trying to reinforce that Apple is on par with any, and the best of, hw/sw companies out there. So, anyone who claims Apple is worse than company X because of customer support issues, IMHO, is smoking it. Again, I’m not trying to start a flame war, but if you want to complain about being fcked, then start complaining about Exxon et al when they are posting 10bn quarterly profits. Every single one of us can always buy joe’s basement PC like Dell, or Gateway (which I have a very nice dell widescreen laptop for work, but the OS is a piece of pooh.) but we don’t, because we (at least I) like what Apple is doing. In the end it’s always about the buck.
October 29th, 2006 at 3:32 pm
i do love my macbook.
since i changed to mac around last year, i realised how easy things became.
i have my macbook repaied twice. once logic board. and again the new heat sink. now i have new firmware installed too.
the macbook is still shutting down, applecare wants to replace logic baord again. but i am asking for a replacement macbook. am i wrong in doing it.
October 29th, 2006 at 5:41 pm
What about those of us with RSD on a 15″ MB? I downloaded 1.1 and when I try to install, I get a message saying that my computer does not need this. Now I’m reading that it’s only for the 17″.
October 30th, 2006 at 3:18 am
Well I have applied the firmware update and it seems a lot better, but if I leave my widgets open for a significant amount of time, the fans starts to run. As soon as I click on the finder the fans starts to cool. Aside from that it seems to be working fine.
October 30th, 2006 at 9:38 am
I also installed the update when it came out and the RSS has not appeared since then. I also don’t think that it was only a hardware problem. The fact is that I would have RSS happening when I booted my computer or woke from sleep mode (was RSS caused by heavy temperature changes ?). Up to the firmware patch, I had been able to use my MacBook for long periods of time by:
1) _always_ clearing up the PMU at boot time
2) having the smcFanControl program run in the background at around 3500 rpm
I really hope that the firmware patch finally resolves the issue.
October 30th, 2006 at 9:44 am
Yep, the firmware update seems to have solved my problems. Before the update, I could almost positively experience a few seconds after waking the Mac from sleep. No more, thank God.
For those of you to hesitate to install the update, why? Is there any risk involved with installing it?
October 30th, 2006 at 8:23 pm
i have a Black MB with RSS and after the installation of SMC Firmware Update 1.1, I haven’t had any shutdown issues. i tested it with youtube, qt, photoshop, dreamweaver, itunes, final cut and other ordinary softwares.
Meantime, I’m still waiting for my heatsink replacement from the Apple Service in Brazil.
I hope that heatsink + update resolves the RSS.
November 1st, 2006 at 5:06 am
Installed smc 1.1 about an hour ago and have restarted a few times without a problem.
….
Ive also awoken from sleep mode without any problem.
So guys, IS THIS THE MAGIC BULLET?
or am I gonna regret that I didnt get a hardware fix?
The fans have been quiet too.
***
Are apple gonna offer free upgrades of Leopard to macbook owners?
***
They should.
November 3rd, 2006 at 12:15 am
Can someone PLEASE tell me if there is a similar fix for the 15″ MacBook Pro? The SMC 1.1 update is only for the 17″. I’m having this problem with the 15″. Why is this not being addressed?
November 3rd, 2006 at 5:44 pm
Well, a week on from downloading the SMC update and NOT ONE RSS.
Seems to be the end of the matter and I’m glad I didn’t bother to go in and get a new heatseek whatever etc.
It’s like a new machine – as it should have been in the first place.
Thank you whoever worked it out. Thank you. My sanity is back from the brink – replete with a brand-spanking new Dell.
Oh well.
November 13th, 2006 at 7:56 am
My wife’s macbook of course decided to go into an RSS frenzy as she was writing her final exam for one of her law school classes. I could have sent Steve Jobs to the bottom of the ocean is been so frustrating. I gave her my reliable PC (hah, that’s odd to say) while I looked for a fix. I found this page, updated the OS, dropped in the firmware upgrade, and low-and-behold, it seems to work! Her computer was shutting down every 40 minutes. She’s been at it only 2 hours as I write this, but so far its holding….standy by for updates!!
November 16th, 2006 at 12:04 pm
I bought my black MB about 2 months ago – upgraded the ram with the authorized dealer to 2 GB. And started having RSS about 2 weeks ago.
My RSS is usually at the beginning when I boot – several times, it would go off after I key in my password for the startup. Other times, it goes off even before the “chime” comes on. Occasionally, it would occur 2-5 minutes after starting up. And this is regardless of whether the main power is plugged in or not.
And I would have to force start the machine – by depressing the power on botton until a single tone is heard – thereafter, the fan will blow for hours.
Extremely frustrating and worrisome – I had to make several presentations to my boss and was really keeping my fingers crossed.
I just downloaded the firmware SME v1.1 – but I guess it is too early to tell. I didn’t change any hardware. There are people like David and sb who apparently still have the problem after the patch.
I am also worried that the firmware is but a stopgap measure to delay the eventual catastrophic breakdown of the machine (after the warranty period)…buying the apple care 3 year warranty is one option but it seems to be rewarding Apple for producing the semi faulty machine – imagine – Apple will be getting alot of MB owners calling them up to buy their 3 year warranty!
I read several of the earlier comments posted in late Oct that the firmware has solved their problems – and since they haven’t posted anymore negative remarks, I supposed their RSS woes are over! I hope mine will be too. I have about 10 more months of warranty to go.
Pete, I think my woes are the most similar to yours – RSS within 2 minutes of booting and full speed fan, etc. I think your views about Apple are balanced, I am not from Apple either. I have been using Apple for many years but I am not a ‘blind cult follower’ kind of fan – I will not hesitate to change if the alternatives are more attractive – but I have my doubts if things will be better with other HW/SW companies. But, EC, sometimes, I do feel exactly the way you do – damn that Stupid high and mighty Apple…but well, at least, they came up with this patch – let’s see if it works.
As for Steve, my heart goes out to you…nobody seems to know the solution to your problem. In fact, this might be the wrong forum for you. Are you using the Macbook pro? This is apparently a Macbook problem. Perhaps you need to look around for the correct forum? Sorry there, can’t be of any help.
Keeping my fingers crossed and any comments on whether to buy the Apple care or not?
November 25th, 2006 at 2:28 pm
I have 12 MacBook/MacBook Pro’s for work. My problem occured after installing version 1.0 of the firmware. I quickly moved to the 1.1 of the firmware and it’s been smooth sailing. I believe the interim version of the firmware was a big part of the problem. I strongly suggest updating to firmware version 1.1. I ran them for 15 hours a day as part of a 24 seat FileMaker network (along with some older iBooks) and didn’t have a single issue.
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