MacBook Pro Mid 2010 Shuts down and restarts randomly while plugged in

"Hey Jared, this is sadly a common problem with A1286 15"" MacBook Pros from 2010 - I have an exact same MacBook Pro with the exact same problem :(

Anyway, the issue is most likely caused by a faulty capacitor on the motherboard. There is a voltage rail that supplies the frame-buffer, which acts as a short-term memory bank for the graphics processor. One of the decoupling capacitors on this voltage rail is a poly-tanalum capacitor, which isn't very reliable when subjected to many heat cycles. This results in the frame buffer voltage rail dropping in voltage every once in a while. If the GPU's voltage drops along this voltage rail, it stops working, resulting in the kernel panic, and sudden restart.

You can either get a new motherboard and install it, or you can get the board repair and pay less. This isn't an easily diagnosable issue though, due to it's intermittency and the fact that most people think the ""GPU"" is at fault. One thing to note though, is that ""reflowing"" the graphics chip with heat (which is a ""repair"" that many places do) will temporarily keep the issue from happening, but is not a proper fix as the issue will conveniently come back again after your warrantee expires. If you do go the board repair route, make sure that they know what they're doing.

If you're feeling ambitious and are comfortable with rework and soldering equipment, you can replace this capacitor and see if the problem goes away."

hello to all.

I have a 17" MBP mid 2010 with the same problem. Do these fixes work for 17" model?

I also have the same problem. I can’t even install OS X, in the process it’s restarting continuously.

Hello,