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So I've been having a number of graphic problems with my 2012 MBP (Non-retnia)

First is screen distortion. I have black rectangles flash black and a pixelated yellow. Moving a window or program over the area solves this. This has been on going for a year, with flare ups. I've been to the apple store, they've replaced the logic board, full re-install, and I've upgraded the ram to 16GB. Still happening. I talked to them today and they won't look at it until I get a new hard drive (It's currently failing) and "My MBP doesn't officially support more than 8GB of ram"

I also have 2 window server crashes. Logs posted below. I have another appointment on Monday when I put original hard drive and RAM back in. I would love some more insight into this.

Logs are too long for here, can be found at https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B2LwrG50dUFDT2JZcndRY1V2cVE/view?usp=sharing

Cate Daniel
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First things first...

You can run the Apple Diagnostics. While booting, hold down the D key. Whatever errors are reported, make note of them and post them to your question.

As an alternative, boot into Recovery Mode (CommandR) or Internet Recovery (CommandOptionR) and try seeing what is happening to your screen.

Finally, You need to get that HDD fixed. There is no point in trying to diagnose further when you have a critical failure taking place; it's the 800lb gorilla in the room.

I am assuming that you have a spinning HDD as these normally came with a 750GB HDD. I am not going to get into too much detail on how to upgrade your drive, as there are many posts where the answer is very similar if not the same as the answer to (initially) to this question that I won't go into detail here.

Check out the answers to the questions below:


Suffice to say, the steps you will take are:

  • Download and create a installation USB flash of OS X El Capitan
  • Back up your data with Time Machine
  • Replace Your Drive. I am partial to Samsung I am using one in my iMac right now.
  • Do a clean Install OS X El Capitan
  • Test your video!

If your video problem persists, then we can start looking at what the cause could be. Chances are, it will be fixed by this point

Once fixed, restore your files and data from the time machine back up and you will again have a working MBP.

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Allan
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    Would the HDD cause this? I forgot to mention I did actually upgrade to an SSD after they replaced the logic board, I still have the original HDD around, but I much prefer it. I was talking with the guy from the store and he said he didn't believe it would be causing this. I was planning on getting a new one this weekend anyways. – Cate Daniel Mar 25 '16 at 02:25
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    Indirectly, yes. It's not so much that drive is failing is causing the video. It's the fact that the drive is failing and whatever it is trying to read/write is corrupted and causing issues with your OS and it is creating a malfunction. – Allan Mar 25 '16 at 02:28
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    fair enough. I'm just getting frustrated that this problem has stuck around so long, to the point of I've replaced just about everything to be replaced and it's still around.

    On another note, does OSX/Linux Kernel still have the problem with trim on samsung SSD? I remeber this was a thing a while back.

     – Cate Daniel Mar 25 '16 at 02:29
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    Not any more. i revised my answer...try running Apple Diagnostics first. – Allan Mar 25 '16 at 02:33
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    I ran the apple diagnostics and it found no memory problems. Ran the extended one over night. I'm assuming that was checking the RAM. When I bought the ram I did run MemTest86 overnight to test it as well and it worked fine. I will be replacing the hard drive today or tomorrow. – Cate Daniel Mar 25 '16 at 13:23
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    What about video problems? Did you test that? Also, did you try booting into recovery mode and see if the problems exist there? – Allan Mar 25 '16 at 13:34
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    I havnt been able to find a way to trigger it. It's not related to stress. That's what's been so frustrating a out this. I will get a new drive today and give it a week. – Cate Daniel Mar 25 '16 at 14:26