Chosen Solution
Hello, I have a MacBook Pro 2011 15’’ i7 2.0ghz, 16GB (1600mhz) RAM, 1 HDD in caddy and 1 SSD. The AMD GPU is broken, and I don’t want to buy a new one of this model because, you know, AMD… I was thinking if I buy this logic board: MacBook Pro 15" Unibody (Mid 2012) 2.3 GHz Logic Board Will it fit into my Macbook? This way I get rid of the junk AMD GPU and get an upgrade of CPU, GPU and USB. The two models looks to have the same size and ports, perhaps I only need to use another heat sink as the geForce can be a little different from the Radeon, but except for this the other things looks compatible. Has someone already done this? Will it work? I don’t want to expense $600 to discover xD.
I hope we will be helped to understand more about the Lcd connector differences. From what I can see with a logic board of a 2.0 Quad i7 in my hands and the picture you linked in front of me, the are no differences whatsoever, in any of the connectors, Lcd too, which seems to me just a standard 40pin. Although personally I never fitted a 2012 board into a 2011 machine I don’t honestly see any good reason why it shouldn’t be fitting. I hope someone will be able to confirm.
I might be able to save you spending your money on replacing your logic board. As it turns out more likely your problem is not the GPU at all but a bad tantalum capacitor! Both AMD & NVIDIA systems have this problem. Sam nailed it here! Logic Board Failure due to Nvidia Graphics processor GT330M If you really want to make the jump I don’t see why it wouldn’t work. Sadly, I haven’t tried it. But why don’t you first see if you can get your system going for now.
