Mini'app'les

the Minnesota Apple Computer Users' Group, Inc.

Mini’app’les Meeting, Tuesday June 16 at 7:00 p.m., Q&A at 6:30 p.m.

by Tim Drenk

The next Mini’app’les meeting is Tuesday, June 16th, the third Tuesday of the month, at the Hackfactory (3119 E. 26th Street Minneapolis, MN 55406). At 6:30 p.m., members of the board and other knowledgable people will be available if you have specific questions you would like answered. We will do our best to address your question and help you troubleshoot the issue.

We look at different ways to stream media starting at 7:00 p.m.. The way that most people may be familiar with is using iTunes and an AppleTV. We will look at that option, but also other media servers and software. Several people have different solutions and will share them tomorrow. 

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20% off $50 iTunes Gift Card

by Tim Drenk

GiftCardMall via eBay Daily deals offers a $50 iTunes Gift Card for $40 with free shipping. Use this discounted iTunes credit to save 20% on apps, music, movies, books and anything else Apple sells in its digital stores.

Each card will be shipped via USPS (with tracking) so you’ll have the opportunity to easily gift it or keep it for yourself. GiftCardMall has a 99.2% positive rating from 138,699 eBay buyers. Read more about GiftCardMall via its official website. Limit 2 per person, which works out to a total of $20 in free iTunes credit.

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Mini’app’les Meeting, Tuesday May 19 at 7:00 p.m., Q&A at 6:30 p.m.

by Tim Drenk

All of us like pictures of family and friends, whether we take the pictures or the pictures are sent to us. We are going to talk about how we organize, catalog, edit, and store our pictures at this month’s Mini’app’les meeting (Tuesday, May 19th, the third Tuesday of the month, at the Hackfactory 3119 E. 26th Street Minneapolis, MN 55406). Several people have volunteered to talk about how they handle pictures. If you use an app or apps to help you catalog and/or edit your photos, we hope you will share your workflow with the group.

And I have no doubt we will have some new Apple Watch users who can share their experiences of using their new devices.

We look forward to seeing you there.

Meeting Notes & Links

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Apple Repair Program for 2011-2013 MacBook Pros With Video Issues

by Pete Bockenhauer

Just a reminder about the repair program for some 2011-2013 MacBook Pros.

https://www.apple.com/support/macbookpro-videoissues/

An affected MacBook Pro may display one or more of the following symptoms:

  • Distorted or scrambled video on the computer screen
  • No video on the computer screen (or external display) even though the computer is on
  • Computer restarts unexpectedly
Affected Models
  • MacBook Pro (15-inch Early 2011)
  • MacBook Pro (15-inch, Late 2011)
  • MacBook Pro (Retina, 15-inch, Mid 2012)
  • MacBook Pro (17-inch Early 2011)
  • MacBook Pro (17-inch Late 2011)
  • MacBook Pro (Retina, 15 inch, Early 2013)

The last year or so, I have been experiencing weird graphics glitches on my MacBook Pro (15-inch Early 2011).  I have seen many others on the web with the same issues with their graphics cards.  Once Apple started this repair program, I saw that I had been experiencing all these symptoms.  I figured I would need to eventually bring my Mac in and get this fixed before the program ended.  However, I was not looking forward to this because I knew they would need to send it out to the repair depot and I would be without my Mac for 3-5 days.

The last couple weeks it had seemed to be getting worse. My Mac’s screen would completely go black for a second and then come back on.  I would also come to my Mac in the morning to find that it had crashed overnight.  Earlier this week it also crashed during the day when I was working.  Then it got considerably worse.  I was working on it and suddenly the song in iTunes I was playing started skipping non-stop and then the screen filled with vertical lines.

IMG_2961

I forced a shut down and tried to get it restarted, but it was no use.  After several attempts at starting from my SuperDuper! clone, SMC reset, NVRAM reset, single user, verbose mode, and safe mode… nothing worked.  So off to the genius bar I went.

The genius ran MRI (Mac Resource Inspector) and immediately it failed the graphics test.  The Video System Test also confirmed that my Mac had the logic board/video problem.

IMG_2962

Luckily this is the problem covered under the aforementioned repair program, so normally a $310 logic board replacement will cost me nothing.

Just a reminder if you have any of these MacBook Pro models and have experienced any graphics problems and/or unexpected restarts, it doesn’t hurt to take it in and have them run the tests to see if you have this problem as well.

The program covers affected MacBook Pro models until February 27, 2016 or three years from its original date of sale, whichever provides longer coverage for you.

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