Imac blueish screen/pinkscreen and lines RANT!

I work in a University and one of our labs has 52 imacs, I must say that they have been the most unreliable machines we have ever bought, expensive to purchase compared to the pc's in the other labs and difficult/expensive to repair. Apple support has been terrible, they are 2 years old 6 have blue/green screens, 3 pink and five others with lines that apprear at random times, the lenght of time it takes apple to fix a fault is rather shocking, we had 4 machins away for nearly six months. we had crt imacs before and they were fairly reliable, these flat panels are terrible, all screen issues no other hardware problems. some of the solutins apple have offered are an absolute disgrace, 2 months waiting to be told to switch them off overnight! great in a 24hour lab, don;t move the screens around so much! and the best one, perhaps the room is too hot with all those machines in it! yes thats right Apple, we keep the students crushed together in a small wooden barn.... Apple have really gone downhill, we have sent back 4 powerbooks, 3 ibooks and had replacement batteries and logicboards under the exchange program in the last year, poor poor poor, still My ipod still works, yay Apple

Yesterday my iMac G4 took a powder with the "pink screen of death" when I woke it up from sleeping. At first I thought it was odd that it would have a pink hue on Valentines Day, but my iMac G5 was fine. I have 10.4.4 and Sophos AV installed on both. I never move the computer (ever) and I have it in an area with good air flow.
So I look it up on the support to no avail. I found some links in the outside world to forum posts that are now missing (deleted). So I just decided to view the posts one-by-one on here and there has to be several dozen different threads started.
My machine is less than three years old, but I didn't RTFD on activating the warranty so therefore I am SOL on getting it fixed through Apple. I talked to an old workmate who is the IT Dir for a school running 500+ iMac G4 (and G5). He told me that he has had close to a dozen failures in the past two months. His Apple support has been poor, in his opinion, but he was able to get them fixed under warranty. He did however, tell me how to fix it, and pointed me to some web articles.
So I tried the fixes on the monitor cable and it appears to have worked for now. The video cable didn't look loose to begin with but pushing it down harder seemed to do the trick. Buying the Heat Sink Compound, an important step, was easy as most Radio Shacks carry it for under $3USD. I doubt that most people would be able to pull this repair off themselves though.
My point is that this does seem to be a widespread issue and I can only hope that Apple does the right thing. I know they have extended repairs past warranty expirations in the past and think they should consider doing that here to save people the hassle of doing it themselves or having some repair shop botch it for $$$.

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Possible solution for white C2D iMacs with screen artifacts or lines

I have a white 20" Core 2 Duo iMac with the famous screen artifacts issues. Screen tearing, horizontal lines, goofy pixels, you name it. From my research it seems there are countless others with these problems.
I tried running the SMC fan control app to boost fan speeds. This helped a little, but did not completely solve the issue. A lot of people think these issues are related to heat, and I agree, but only partially. When a graphics chip overheats it is eventually damaged. I have damaged my share of graphics chips while overclocking them in my PCs. In the case of my iMac and maybe plenty of others, I still have issues if the GPU is hot or cold.
I installed WinXP using bootcamp. I finally found an application which will change the clock speed of the GPU on the fly. The X1600 GPU in my iMac has a 475Mhz core speed and 500Mhz memory speed. I cut these down to 400Mhz on the core and 400Mhz on the memory. At these lower speeds I no longer have any issues with screen tearing, horizontal lines, or random crashing. I do still have a few wierd pixels here and there, but they are not all that noticeable and I can live with them.
Now for the fun part. I wanted to permanently fix these speeds into my GPU so when I boot back to Mac OS X, I don't have any issues, and I no longer have to boost fan speeds or run any additional apps. I spent most of today taking apart my iMac, putting DOS on a spare SATA hard drive, and running an external monitor while booting my iMac with the spare drive hanging out the side. All this so I can run ATIflash, and use it to dump an image of the GPU BIOS ROM file.
Well, I ended up finding out the ATI GPU has no ROM to flash. My best guess is open firmware or something like that passes this data on to the GPU when the system boots.
So, in my case slowing the GPU down significantly reduced my problems while running within windows. I am 100% confident slowing the GPU down will also improve issues within Mac OS X, but I have no way to pull this off.
If Apple reads this, or if anyone has any connections at Apple, can we please get an optional firmware update to reduce the speeds of the X1600 GPU? It won't fix all the iMacs with these issues, but it will fix quite a few, and for those out there who don't have any issues at all with their white C2D iMacs, lowering the GPU speeds will most likely prevent damage from inevitably occurring, keeping them a happy customer.
Now, some of you may not like the idea of a slower GPU, but if I have to pick between a slower GPU and an $800 logic board, I will take the slower GPU any day.

There is a little easier Way to Navigate in Doing an F.D.R. than that Method: I listed it here if you prefer going this Route..
2. Re: FACTORY RESET FOR RAZR AN RAZR MAXX

IMac 2011, screen freezes and fans start spinning

Hello,
I have this really wierd problem with my iMac i5 2011 edition since a month or so...
A lot of times when I am downloading or watching a movie or playing games under OSX on my iMac my screen slowly freezes, it always starts with my finder and then te rest goes, I get the marble of death and shortly after that the fans start spinning like crazy, they start slow but after a minute or so they make a lot of nice. Take in mind then I am unable to use my iMac in anyway, the mouse moves but it doesn't respond to clicks and also my keyboard doesn't respond, I keep getting the marble of death still.
The wierd thing is that sometimes it doesn't do this for 2/3 days and sometimes it does it like 3/4 in an hour (have to restart manually). Also, this is very interesting, I have a version of Windows 7 installed on my iMac wich I use mainly for gaming and under windows it NEVER freezes in any kind, even when I game like 5/6 hours long straight.
Therefor I thought it must be a software problem so I did a complete system reboot 2 days ago but that didn't help, already froze 3 times since...
Can anyone help me? I still have 2 months of applecare but I have a LAN party soon so I am not to anxious to go 3 weeks without my iMac, maybe there is a simple solution that I am missing...

Some things you can try:
1. Try a new user account, create one in System Preferences -> Users and Groups, test to see if the issue still persists in this new user account, this will give us a lot of information. (if the problem is the same or it vanishes, let us know)
2. Make sure all your software is up-to-date, Apple Logo -> Software update.
3. Unplug all 3rd party devices, just keep in the necessary, Power, Keyboard + Mouse, no ethernet or external hard drives etc.
4. Reset the PRAM http://support.apple.com/kb/PH4405
5. Reset the SMC http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3964
6. Boot to the recovery partition (CMD + R on startup until you see a spinning cog with an apple logo, then let go) -> Choose english as the main language -> Choose Disk Utility -> Select your hard drive from the left pane of Disk Utility (NOT Macintosh HD, the one that will look similar to: 1TB ST3200WAJS) -> Select the 'First Aid' tab -> Bottom right of the window it will say 'S.M.A.R.T Status: ________' ... What does it say after smart status?
7. While still inside the Recovery Partition, select Macintosh HD -> First Aid (tab) -> Verify Disk -> Repair Disk (unless it says the volume Macintosh HD appears to be OK) -> Verify Disk Permissions -> Repair Disk Permissions (if there are differing permissions on the disk)
Let us know if the issue still persists, but make sure you do all of those steps correctly and post back as much information as possible (PRAM takes two chimes at startup, unplug the power cable for 15 seconds, plug it back in, wait 5 seconds, turn on... make sure you follow all articles)
Good Luck!
MiiCK

Can't reset my systeem admin account and all startpunt options respons with a grey screen, lock and line for password

i bought a 2nd hand iMac 21'5, 2010. First I installed Mavericks and entered a password which I forgot, and did not activate my appleid at that time.
when trying to install a new bought program, I had to enter the sys adm acoount password which I had forgotten.
TRied the options found on internet, but did not have a mavericks startup disk. downloaded Mavericks again and then tried to creatie a startpunt disk. did not work as mavericks immediately started with the installation.
Got the original Mac os X cd from the person I brought the iMac from, but now found that I cannot use the CMD r option. then my Mac opens with a grey screen, a lock and only allow a password input.
None of the startup options (eg d) are working anymore and or end up in the grey startup screen asking a password or just ingenomen the request and starts the Mac and is fully operational without full access to the systeem functions (as these require the systeem password which I forgotten). However my Mac still starts and I use mail and internet Ans all other installed programs. but I cannot create an account as I do not know the sys adm. password.
When using terminal and give the command mountain -uw / I receive the reply:
GetMasterBlock: Error 13 opening /dec/rdisk0s2
mount-hfs: Operation not permitted.
CAn somebody help me how to reset my system, even if this means I loose all data? I bought all software in the iStore, so asume I can re-install it anyway.

Ask the person you bought it from for the firmware password and supply that into the box. You'll then be able to use the Option key shortcut and can get into the recovery partition to reset the administrator password.
(109777)

IMac G5 screen dies and applications freeze/open Finder instead

I'm posting this on behalf of a friend who has an iMac PowerPC G5 and is currently trying to reset her SMU.
Evidently about four days ago, her computer abruptly started suffering weird periods where her screen goes kind of halfway dark, into a semi-translucent sort of state. She then stops being able to type...sort of...for instance, in AIM, she can hit enter to send a half-written message but she can't add any more to it...and though she can move around a little bit on the screen, doing things like selecting open programs instead brings up their location in the Finder Applications window.
I'm trying to help her figure out how to fix it but can't find anything like this anywhere on the internet; does anyone have any idea what might be causing this? I had her reset the SMU because it sort of sounded like her computer was trying to go to sleep and wasn't sure how to go about it; I kind of doubt this is the real source of the problem though.
Any help or suggestions would be appreciated.

Hi Rosalind and welcome to the Apple Discussions.
Did you direct your friend to the knowledge base article:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1767
and follow all the steps in there?

MBP (early 2008) Screen flicker and line distortions

Hi there,
My macbook pro has been running fine for the past 3 and a bit years, but yesterday this very strange issue started occuring.
At random times, the screen with start flickering quite quickly and then random line distortions appear on the screen. After a minute or 2, the screen freezes but I can move the mouse without being able to click on anything.
So then I have to press the power off button to shut down the computer. Once I turn it back on, there are lines and distortions all over the grey screen except on the Apple logo.
Next time it happens, I will try and save a photo of it.
In the console, this seems to be what happened. I must admit that none of this makes sense for me.
13/01/11 10:30:59 AM com.apple.launchd[1] * launchd[1] has started up. *
13/01/11 10:31:43 AM com.apple.WindowServer67 Thu Jan 13 10:31:43 jonathan-marskells-macbook-pro.local WindowServer67 <Error>: kCGErrorFailure: Set a breakpoint @ CGErrorBreakpoint() to catch errors as they are logged.
13/01/11 10:31:49 AM com.apple.launchd.peruser.50292 (com.apple.ReportCrash) Falling back to default Mach exception handler. Could not find: com.apple.ReportCrash.Self
13/01/11 10:31:58 AM com.apple.launchd.peruser.50292 (com.apple.Kerberos.renew.plist116) Exited with exit code: 1
13/01/11 10:32:18 AM GoogleSoftwareUpdateAgent119 LCC Scroll Enhancer loaded
13/01/11 10:32:20 AM 0x0-0x9009.com.Logitech.Control Center.Daemon122 objc122: Class comLogitechScrollEnhancerLoader is implemented in both /Library/InputManagers/LCC Scroll Enhancer Loader/LCC Scroll Enhancer Loader.bundle/Contents/MacOS/LCC Scroll Enhancer Loader and /Library/ScriptingAdditions/LCC Scroll Enhancer Loader.osax/Contents/MacOS/LCC Scroll Enhancer Loader. One of the two will be used. Which one is undefined.
I am running on 10.6.5.
Thanks for your help in advance.
Macbook Pro 15' 2.2Ghz 2gb RAM early 2008 Mac OS X (10.6.5)

From what I've read on different posts regarding video card issues and the early 2008 15" MBPs, or "affected models", Apple seems very selective at what they'll honor for repair. Hopefully my MBP will be repaired under this recall, but am not holding my breath.
My 15" MBP (early 2008 Penryn) has developed video card issues I suspect. It doesn't do the dark screen as others have which Apple is more likely to repair under the recall, but random batches of lined patterns show up on the display, it will blink sometimes, then it will totally lock up forcing a hard shut down with the power button.
I took it into a local Apple Authorized Service center, they ran the NVIDIA test on it which it passed, showing that the "known" defect wasn't the issue with my computers video card. Well something's screwed up with the video card most likely. They recommended taking it to the Genius bar at the Apple Store which I plan to do. It's less than 3 years old, Good grief!
I've been an avid Apple user for over 16 years, and have hardly ever run into hardware issues. Guess I've been lucky. But how Apple will handle my MBPs issues is unknown to me. Hopefully it will be positive, but am not holding my breath.
Art

2009 Imac i7 Screen glitchy and freezing (see picture)

My 2009 27" iMac just recently started doing this:
It sometimes is unresponsive, and sometimes the display will start to glitch in this way, but certain functions are still responsive. For example sometimes I can restart the computer through the apple menu, sometimes I can save a file before restarting. Other times the cursor freezes as well and nothing responds. So far restarting the computer has fixed it everytime. It started about two days ago and it's happened about six times. Any thoughts about what this might be? Has anyone seen this before? Any ideas how to check what it is?

Is there a risk of further damage if I delay taking it in? I mean I'll want to get it fixed soon because I want it working properly, but do I need to stop using it in the meantime, or take it in tomorrow or something? Or just as soon as I get a chance in the next few weeks would be fine?

HT2404 I am getting notices from web sites that they won't support Safari 4.1.3 much longer, but I'm having trouble finding a version of Safari that will work with Mac OS 10.4.11. I have a n iMac flat screen "lampshade" and still love it.

Help welcomed. How can I upgrade Safari without upgrading to OS 10.5?

Safari let's you change your identity ( user agent string ) to anything. This is what the server thinks you are running. Want to be run Windows 7 IE8? No problem.
http://www.onedigitallife.com/2005/08/03/changing-safaris-user-agent/
Whether the pages looks good depends on the capabilities of the Browser.
Robert

My Imac is showing gray screen with red line when booting and restarts again

My Imac is showing gray screen with red line when booting and restart again, I can load it in windows 7 safe mode with red lines across the display, pls help

The graphic card is damaged. You can't do anything more than taking your computer to an Apple Store or reseller and getting your graphic card replaced.
Sometimes, when the graphic card is damaged, operating systems can't start. That's caused because the drivers that make the graphic card work detect an error, telling the operating system that the graphic card is unusable, so the operating system can't start and it restarts. However, you can start in safe mode because operating systems use a basic driver in this startup mode

My iMac computer screen is blurred by black and white lines.

My iMac G5 screen is blurred by black and white horizontal lines and tiny rectangles. This occured after I woke it up from sleeping. Everything else seems to be working fine, but is impossible to see what I'm doing. Any ideas on how to fix this?

Fixed it! Rebooting the computer while holding down the command, option, P and R keys while letting the chime ring 4 or 5 times did the trick.

Intel iMac (Early 2008) Has vertical lines on the screen and doesn't boot.

My iMac froze up tonight, and upon restarting it there are a number of yellow vertical line segments throughout the display, and it will not boot completely into the OS. The spinning segment just stops and the computer does nothing. I inserted my Leopard disc to run a hardware test but holding D during bootup does nothing, even though I can hear the disc spin up.
http://img651.imageshack.us/img651/1843/img1821uf.jpg
http://img707.imageshack.us/img707/1651/img1823s.jpg
Any Thoughts?

I've had this same exact issue and have had to have the graphics card replace (nvidia 8800gs).
It seems these graphics cards are defective in some way.
Unfortunately my iMac is out of warranty and I must pay 3500dkk ( 500usd ) for repair.
I'm very disappointed as to the reliability of these iMacs as I've only had it for 2 years my old iMac g4 1ghz has performed better than this and is actually what I'm using until my so called new iMac is back from repairs

Screen Flicker and Glitch on 24" iMac, Early 2009

For a while now, my iMac has been having somewhat random display glitches, flickers, freezes, and kernel panics that can only be fixed by shutting down the computer.
Most of these screen glitches go like this: The display flickers black quickly, letting me know that an issue is going to arise. The issues that could happen are as follows:
A blue line glitch (very common)
a random artifact glitch (somewhat uncommon)
a freeze-up (very common)
a kernel panic
Let me describe these:
There are several types of "display glitches" I've been experiencing. Some of them involve random artifacts that are randomly displayed and seem to be hovering over whatever is going on on the screen–for example, once I was browsing Facebook and the glitch occurred, so a square of my browser screen was sort of cut out and stuck on the screen above everything else going on. The issue wasn't fixed until I restarted the computer. This glitch, however, wouldn't show up in screenshots. These are somewhat less common because it seems if this one happens then it either gets worse very fast and there are random pieces of my active windows all over the screen or it freezes the computer up entirely, or even results in a kernel panic.
Another "display glitch" that is far more common is a sort of line glitch. It's very strange: blue lines will outline random shapes and things all over the screen. Pictures on my browser appear distorted and videos look VERY weird. The dock has the lines and random blue pixels as well. The desktop background appears distorted. This glitch often starts with the screen flickering black and the various blue lines appearing. The lines change shape as the objects on the screen move around.The issue doesn't appear in screenshots but I documented it by taking crude videos and pictures on my phone that give examples.
Here's a link to my video of a video about a nonrelated screen glitch. I was actually searching Google for a solution but it turned out to be unhelpful, but since the screen glitch happened to be going on I decided to record it as an example. Notice how the blue lines move with the video...
Here are some pictures:
This next screenshot looks a little creepy with the armored polar bear–it's a LoL build on Mobafire. CLICK HERE TO SEE WHAT IT'S SUPPOSED TO LOOK LIKE:
---NOTE: My computer actually JUST screen glitched and froze up completely, at which point I had to shut it down and reboot. Luckily the post was saved! Just in case you were wondering how often these things occur.
This issue is getting worse and worse. I'm not sure what triggers it, but it seems like graphics-intensive programs like 3D games can trigger it–especially, it seems, when I toggle on and off fullscreen. It looks like it could be a graphics card issue, because if it was a software problem it would seem like it should show up in the screenshots. It's sort of an underwhelming graphics card, but meh. My mom is having a panic attack and backing up everything on the computer and we're thinking about just reinstalling OS X altogether.
Here's some general info about the computer:
General info:
Model Name: iMac
Model Identifier: iMac9,1
Processor Name: Intel Core 2 Duo
Processor Speed: 2.93 GHz
Number of Processors: 1
Total Number of Cores: 2
L2 Cache: 6 MB
Memory: 4 GB
Bus Speed: 1.07 GHz
Graphics and Displays:
Chipset Model:          NVIDIA GeForce GT 120
Type:          GPU
Bus:          PCIe
PCIe Lane Width:          x16
VRAM (Total):          256 MB
Vendor:          NVIDIA (0x10de)
Device ID:          0x0655
Revision ID:          0x00a1
ROM Revision:          3370
Displays:
iMac:
Resolution:          1920 x 1200
Pixel Depth:          32-Bit Color (ARGB8888)
Main Display:          Yes
Mirror:          Off
Online:          Yes
Built-In:          Yes
Any help would be appreciated. I've looked for solutions for quite some time, but none of the problems people seem to be experiencing match my issue. Thanks!

Lion causes your system to use more resources so it will run hotter. If you haven't cleaned you iMac's dust out:
As old as your iMac is, have you cleaned out the dust? Dust buildup can lead to over heating issues. Remove any and all things plugged into it including the power cord, Remove the RAM access grille. Vacuum all openings starting with the RAM access area (air intake). Vacuum all ports and plugs, DVD slot and the opening across the top of the rear of the body. Blow compressed air through all your openings and vacuum again to remove any dust you loosend. Reinstall the RAM grille. Plug in the keyboard and mouse if not blue tooth. Insert power cord...
You are now in a perfect position to do a
SMC RESET
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3964
Shut down the computer.
Unplug the computer's power cord and ALL peripherals.
Wait 15 seconds.
Attach the computers power cable.
Wait another 5 seconds and press the power button to turn on the computer.
Here is a Widget to monitor your temps and other operations:
http://islayer.com/apps/istatpro/

Strange restart screen happening and advice needed on new imac purchase

Well first thing first, i just sold my imac 20" CD for a refurbished 24" iMac C2D directly from apple. The first thing i noticed is screen during the restart process that i have never seen on the multiple macs that i have owned. It looks like terminal/ms-dos with a black screen and lines of white text that indicate what is going on in the restart process. it doesnt really affect anything, i just don't really like it showing up, i would rather have the grey apple with spinning marks under it. Is this a setting somewhere that i don't know about?
And for the second thing. Because of this black screen that happens during start up i noticed.....a green stuck pixel... I am pretty picky about my things and when i noticed this i started freaking out a little bit. I know that stuck pixels are very common in LCD's i just didnt really want one in mine. I tried massaging it and all of the programs out there that are supposed to "un stick" it with no luck. I know apple is not likely to replace a unit for a single stuck pixel but i was going to try my hardest to get it replaced until......i looked in the system information and noticed that i somehow got the upgraded gforce 7600 256mb video card. So my question is should i stop complaining and take the $125 video card upgrade for free or try and get my unit replaced for my stuck pixel. BTW, the stuck pixel is only viewable on black/really dark screens and it is located in the middle display, about 2 inches right. Thanks in advance

A very tough question to answer. I am a little picky also and a stuck pixel would drive me up a wall. But have you tried to reinstall the system to see if it fixes the weird startup. Weighing the video card against the pixel I would have to go with seeing if apple could fix or repair the screen without switching the machine. If it is still under warranty they will try to no end to repair it before they just send you out another unit.
So I guess my answer is to make them repair the system thus saving you your video card.

Please do me provide with software which can support flipping and sreaming page on 27" iMac touch screen display

Please do me provide with software which can support flipping and sreaming page on 27" iMac touch screen display

IakovM,
See below for a few links.
You should ask the people at Troll Touch if the have a software to create a user interface.
Usually, the maker will provide programmers with the programming codes and a interface guide line on how to program the different gestures.
I know that PQLabs as a SDK for their touch screens.
With the programming codes in hand, any good Flash or HTML 5 programmer can setup a web site that will take advantage of the touch screen.
One thing I can tell you is that with touch screens based web sites, when it comes to links or buttons to push,everything needs to be bigger than on a standard web site. People will be using their fingers to do the clicking.
A finger is a much bigger pointer than a mouse pointer!
So links or buttons that are too small or to close to screen edges will be hard to click.
You can look at these for possible solutions:
TUIO is an open framework that defines a common protocol and API for tangible multitouch surfaces.
http://www.tuio.org/
http://kivy.org/#home
http://www.touchuserinterface.com/2009/06/multi-touch-programming-for-python-and .html

IMac 27 : Screen covered with vertical straight lines

It started a week ago while playing Civilization V on my iMac : the screen suddenly displayed vertical blue (alterned with dark blue) vertical straight lines, the sound was still working, i could hear the music from the game. Then the screen turned black and i could'nt hear anything anymore, i had to restart the computer with the apple button. The same happened again with civilization, once with green lines. And today, while restarting after this bug, the screen displayed multicolor lines instead of the grey wallpaper with the apple.
What is that due to ? Is it a physical problem of the screen ? Any solution ?

If it only happened while your were playing the game I would have suggested it was an video card overheat problem. But if you are now having problems even when not playing the game then perhaps the video card is just failing, maybe accelerated or caused by the overheating.
Try doing an smc and pram reset and see if that affect anything.
If you are having a booting problem then try booting in safe mode to see if there is still a booting problem. Also boot from your installer dvd and repair/verify your drives (not repair permissions).

Imac blueish screen/pinkscreen and lines RANT!

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