Graphics problems on the MacBook Pro

Yesterday, I stumbled across a grim issue with the MacBook Pro graphics chip, the nVidia 8600 GT. I'm not convinced it's a hardware issue, yet, but this morning's disaster sure looks like one. I booted up, twice, and saw a strange blocky pattern on the screens. The third time, I plugged in the power, and it booted without a problem. I shut down and rebooted, removed the power cable, and then rebooted again, but couldn't recreate the problem. I did take photos, though. More Info:

• Apple: Display Freezing - http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1065674

If you can SSH into your Mac with the crashed graphics and run:

sudo /usr/bin/killall -HUP WindowServer but this will quit (kill) all open programs running in the window OS. At least you can do a clean restart. Fixing it The first thing is to back up.

• ChronoSync
• Sync .Mac
• Copy my User directory to an external HD
• Back up the system log.
• Remove the LGU:

http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=6669894

• Community rollback package version 1.2:

http://www.hurrikenux.com/Testing/UnofficialLeopardGraphicsUpdateRollback1.2.zip from hurrikenux Creative.

Then, run Software Update. The LGU appears again. Select it, and then choose Update > Ignore Update... to avoid installing it again.