“In July 2008, Nvidia publicly acknowledged a higher than normal failure rate for some of their graphics processors due to a packaging defect. At that same time, Nvidia assured Apple that Mac computers with these graphics processors were not affected. However, after an Apple-led investigation, Apple has determined that some MacBook Pro computers with the Nvidia GeForce 8600M GT graphics processor may be affected.”
Ouch.
Cupertino (CA) – Apple took an unusually hard shot at Nvidia’s credibility yesterday: Apple said that it found that GeForce GPUs used in some Macbook Pro systems are failing, while Nvidia “assured” the company that the supply to Apple was not affected by what appears to be a GPU packaging issue.
Apple quietly confirmed the GPU failures in a post on its support pages, which seems to have been first reported by Gizmodo. The post’s phrasing is very unusual and puts the blame for the failures as well as their late discovery on Nvidia. There is lots of room for interpretation what Apple tries to say, but the sharp wording at least suggests that Nvidia had no idea which of its GPUs are affected by the packaging problems. On the other end of the spectrum, Apple may also say, in a very careful way, that Nvidia simply lied about the extent of its chip packaging problem.
