Odd Display Problems - Solved (& More...)

Earlier today I picked up the weird display problem shown in this thread: http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1524985&tstart=30
I went ahead and reinstalled the Leopard Graphics Update and reset the PRAM. Problems seemed to go away. But then I ended up with an even weirder white-on-black display that looked a lot like an xray. So reset the PRAM again. No fix. Then restarted in SAFE mode - all OK, so probably not hardware. Then ran Disk Utility from the Leopard System CD. No probs revealed. Problem (white-on-black) came back on restart. Searched Discussion base and found reference to wrong toggle set in Universal Access System Preference. This was the white-on-black problem and toggling to black-on-white solved it.
Here's the part I don't understand (but like): the machine is much faster than it was. Safari pages load with great speed, apps open faster, etc. It may have been the series of restarts that cleared something, but somewhere in this troubleshooting string things overall got a lot better. Beats me, but like it... YMMV.

I just have some general thoughts. Does it look correct if you connect it to a different monitor? (to find out if the TV / TV connection is the problem) Did you install something in your house that could affect the signal that is being transmitted through the wire? (I highly doubt it) Are you SURE you didn't install / update / change any settings before it stopped working?
The problem you described reminds me a little of the glitchy GTK problems I was having with my Radeon. My problem ended up being related to the open source driver and KMS. Is there another driver or video card you could try? Is your video card getting too hot?

Similar Messages

Odd display problems [solved]

I am running mythtv on arch, an nvidia GeForce 7600 GS video card, with a Panasonic Viera plasma TV as the display. I've always had overscan problems (that I have not found a good answer for) but recently started having really strange video issues.
About a week ago, while running myth and without having upgraded or changed anything, I started getting lines of white or black garbage on the display, almost like the tops of lines of letters that are cut off. They would appear here and there, and got worse as I moved from screen to screen. Ultimately the real lines of text on the myth display would get distorted to the point where they were illegible. When I dropped out to gnome, the dots were gone, but the screen resolution was off from where it should be. Later on while in myth it started repainting the screen from corner to corner diagonally, almost like some kind of video wipe.
Finally dumping out to a console, the overscan was way worse than it had been before, although sometimes logging out and logging back in would bring it back. Now it takes a reboot to get there.
After the problem started, I updated the system, reinstalled xorg, mythtv, gnome, tried running under awesome, pulled my old xorg.conf and tried running without, none of which helped at all.
It's difficult to really describe this stuff, but if anyone has any ideas of where to start trying to fix it, I'd appreciate hearing.
Last edited by timm (2010-08-21 11:24:02)

I just have some general thoughts. Does it look correct if you connect it to a different monitor? (to find out if the TV / TV connection is the problem) Did you install something in your house that could affect the signal that is being transmitted through the wire? (I highly doubt it) Are you SURE you didn't install / update / change any settings before it stopped working?
The problem you described reminds me a little of the glitchy GTK problems I was having with my Radeon. My problem ended up being related to the open source driver and KMS. Is there another driver or video card you could try? Is your video card getting too hot?

Odd display problems

I run two 19" CRT monitors off my G4 QS...have for years with no problems. This morning, I arrived in my office, computer running with both monitors displaying fine, and, without touching anything, the left one went dark. I thought I might have jostled my desk and loosened the AC connection, so I shut down, checked all connections to find no problem. I restarted, only to find that my right monitor had lost its signal too. The power light on this monitor went from green (normal-on) to yellow after 10 or 15 seconds of being turned on (never seen that before).
I didn't have time to deal with this problem, and had to go home to get some work done, leaving the office computer running. Late this afternoon, I popped by the office again for 5 minutes while running errands and found the yellow light on the right monitor blinking (another "never seen before"). I turned off the power on the display, then back on, and the display actually appeared, but at a very odd resolution (sign-in screen icons were signficantly larger than I'd ever seen them), and there was a strange distorted vertical line that "zapped" on and off. Again, I didn't have time to deal with this and had to leave it.
I've done some research here at home, but still don't have a strong sense of what the problem might be. Might resetting the NVRAM do anything? Can you even reset NVRAM on a QS? Might it be a graphics card problem? If that is likely, what card would be a good replacement?
Many thanks...
Message was edited by: Richard Pasley

Have you tried using only one monitor?
Have you tried starting up from a CD?
You can reset NVRAM. Resetting NVRAM "fixes" some display problems. See Mac PRAM, NVRAM, CUDA/PMU & Battery Tutorial
 Cheers, Tom

HELP! An odd display problem

Dear Sirs
Please refer to this attached link of screenshow, will make the problem a lot easier to explain:
http://www.downloadthis.co.uk/display.jpg
I seem to have lost the nice hierarchichal layout of e.g. my computer. I dont know how and why, but I would like to have it back again i.e. the nice sectioning of shared files, hard drives etc
Please ignore the blue / silver difference - i know how to fix that but please help with the above!
Thanks
Asmar

ensure both of yours HDD's are detected by OS.(check it from device manager(sysdm.cpl))
type in "run" type there "diskmgmt.msc" and hit enter, check partition status from there, ensure each one has corespond assigned drive letter.
about layout, click on view and choice prefered way.(etc: details). also made right click and select "arrange icons by", and tick "shown in groups" to restore style from 2nd picture.

Display problem - blue tinge, low res

My first gen 20" intel imac has an odd display problem.
The screen has a light blue tinge to it which show up particularly clearly in finder windows which i have set to display white. I've played around with brightness/contrast settings as well as colour calibration but to no avail.
This problem started a few months ago when it would periodically flick between being normal and this blue tinge. For the last few weeks the blue tinge is all I get.
The other symptom seems to be a reduction in resolution in 'blue tinge mode' which is particularly noticeable when watching movies.
Does anyone out there have any ideas?

does this problem occur on external screen?
Regards,
Jin Li
May this year, be the year of 'DO'!
I am a volunteer, and not a paid staff of Lenovo or Microsoft

I am using Firefox 3.6.8. Oddly, my problem appeared a few hours PRIOR to Firefox automatically installing the latest updates (the week ending 7/23), not afterwards. The problem is this: the browser continues to display tabs, the reload/home/history/favor

I am using Firefox 3.6.8. Oddly, my problem appeared a few hours PRIOR to Firefox automatically installing the latest updates (the week ending 7/23), not afterwards. The problem is this: the browser continues to display tabs, the reload/home/history/favorites icons, URL field and Google search field while in full-screen mode, so it's not really full-screen anymore. How can I correct this?
== This happened ==
Every time Firefox opened
== Oddly, my problem appeared a few hours PRIOR to Firefox automatically installing the latest updates (the week ending 7/23), not afterwards.

Do you have that problem when running in the Firefox SafeMode?
[http://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Safe+Mode]
''Don't select anything right now, just use "Continue in SafeMode."''
If not, see this:
[http://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/troubleshooting+extensions+and+themes]

How to solve the flash Builder 4.6 scroll view and textinput display problem?

I have a dynamic form application which worked well on flash builder 4.5, having display problems in flash builder 4.6 now. What I did is adding
TextInput objects to a scroll view and set the texts for them dynamically. Everything is fine after the screen loaded. But if I scroll down, sometimes the texts will be placed in wrong positions. I attached the screen copy of the wrong display. Does anybody know how to solve this problem? Thanks.

Check out the two threads below (if you have not already). I have not tried it but aeonus describes an approach that made me think of something that might work ... It is a workaround but, what if you have a text field (txtA) with the skin that does not allow soft keyboard selection, but does scroll correctly, and on the onClick event of that text field, you dynamically cover it with another text field (txtB) that does allow soft keyboard selection, (but does not scroll properly) and trigger the keyboard. After you get the entry from the user, set the value of txtA and destroy txtB ... leaving you (theoretically) with properly scrolling text fields. If you have a lot of those in your app, you might want to write a component that implements that behavior.
"Create a dynamic textfield, and on click, invoke create a StageText instance at the same location as the textfield (by setting the StageText.viewPort property)
Finally, set StageText.softKeyboardType to "numeric" and call StageText.assignFocus();"
http://forums.adobe.com/thread/915019?tstart=0
http://forums.adobe.com/thread/911214?tstart=0

How to solve the image display problem in the iTunes Store

Hi guys!
I just want to give a work-around for all of you having the image display problem in the iTunes Store. In my case only the square images in the slider sections won't load:
I had this in my last W7-installation and got it again in W8 after the first few weeks.
There are a lot of reports about this problem out there and adhoc solutions like 'clear the cache' or 'reinstall and drink ice tea' that do not work. It is obviously a file request error. It is all about finding out which server addresses get blocked by your computer.
Solution: Go to your firewall and your Anti-virus-program. There must be a whitelist option. In Kaspersky, check the web-options, the banner-options and the firewall-options, because the all have whitelists. The following addresses have to be whitelisted:
*.apple
*.mzstatic.apple.com.akadns.net
*.mzstatic.com.edgesuite.net
*.da1.akamai.net
*.itunes.apple.com
se.itunes.apple.com
upp.itunes.apple.com
ax.init.itunes.apple.com
xp.apple.com
*.mzstatic.com
client-api.itunes.apple.com
www.apple.com.edgekey.net
www.isg-apple.com.akadns.net
Press Ctrl + R in the iTunes Shop then and browse throught the music sections. All images should be displayed correctly now.
If not, there might be more Apple servers involved in your case. You can find them by running a DNS sniffing tool like the DNS query sniffer by Nirsoft or Wireshark.

Phone restarting randomly could be loose battery. Tighten by putting a small strip of electrical tape on the back edge.
THE BITTERNESS OF POOR QUALITY, LINGERS LONG AFTER THE CHEAPNESS OF PRICE, IS SOON FORGOTTEN.

[Problem Solved] On screen display not working on T60

I replace my xp with a Vista Business.
All the drivers are installed. But the on screen display is not working well. Nothing display when I press the volume up/down/mute button. However, other buttons like Fn+F3, Fn+F5 do display on screen.
Anyone knows how to solve this?
Thanks a lot.
Message Edited by szsy on 10-02-2008 08:11 PM
Solved!
Go to Solution.

problem solved.
looks like I need to install a Lenovo System Interface Driver. This is just for ATI graphic card users and nVidia users don't need it.
Thanks a lot.

Emac 1.42 ghz external display mirroring will it solve dark display problems ?

I have an emac 1.42 ghz and the display is getting dark I have the contrast turned all the way up and the contrast turned up one notch in the universal access. When the computer is shutdown sometimes when it starts back up it is very dark almost unusable until it warms up or is running for about 20 minutes. Then it is normal. If I use an external monitor on the mini vga port with an apple adapter will it have the same darkness/display problems. I really like this computer but if the external display wont fix the problem I will need to wipe the drive while I still have a useable display

I'd say it's likely to help using a different monitor.
I think you could possibly check by doing a Screen Capture, which I believe gets it frm the graphic card, then view that capture on aniher computer, or post it here for us to view.

My original post, locked by this forum. Display problem related

Hi G5 Gurus,
The display problem first, we all know when screen savers display, a click on the mouse will bring you back to the active desktop, this was how it worked., but now, sometimes a click cause the G5 to sleep!
As for the sleep, I dare not to put it to sleep these days, because I am afriad it may cause a fire by over heating. Sometmes, actually four times in the past few months, my G5 could wake up by itself, followed by a extrem high speed running of the cooling fan, it sounded like a hair dryer running in the same room. Sometimes the sreen could light up, just like real wake up, sometimes, it was black. No clicks the mouse or keyboeard could bring it back to normal, I had to press and hold the power button to turn it off.
This crazy problem happened for the first time last summer, a dead hard disk was the cost. Apple replaced it, but failed to detect the cooling or power or display problem. I was given one month extended free service, but right after its end, the problem was back and happened even more often.
Please let me know if any of you had the same problem and please advise what to do.
100s Gs of thanks.
Songyan
iMac G5 Mac OS X (10.4.8)
la teller
Posts: 1
From: Los Angeles
Registered: Jan 10, 2007
Re: What's the problem? Display? Power supply? Cooling? My G5's gone mad
Posted: Jan 10, 2007 2:21 PM in response to: Bad luck G5
I have the EXACT same problem. In fact, I could not have described it better myself. What gives? I brought it in to the "genius" bar and they repolaced the power supply free of charge but the problem is still there. I noticed they ordered a new logic board but did not end up replacing it after all. Did you have yours replaced and did it work? Is this a known issue?
imac G5 17 inch Mac OS X (10.3.9)
Bad luck G5
Posts: 8
From: UK
Registered: Jan 10, 2007
Re: What's the problem? Display? Power supply? Cooling? My G5's gone mad
Posted: Jan 11, 2007 1:20 PM in response to: la teller
Hi La teller,
Thank you for your reply. The 'genius' here in London only replace the dead hard disk, which I belive was a victim of this problem. I was told they couldn't find anything wrong with the power supply or the cooling system.
Now at lest I know I am not the only bad luck guy. Let's wait and see if others are having the same problem. I am not sure if this is a known issue to Apple, even if it is, it may take years before they can offer a recall or free repaire. I noticed that some G5s have already been suffering from power problems and a free repaire was offered.
Thank you again and hope Apple can take our concerns into their consideration soon.
Songyan
iMac G5 Mac OS X (10.4.8)
stopha6
Posts: 1
From: US
Registered: Jan 12, 2007
Re: What's the problem? Display? Power supply? Cooling? My G5's gone mad
Posted: Jan 12, 2007 7:43 AM in response to: Bad luck G5
Hello,
I'm also having this problem (fan running, won't come out of sleep), just spoke with an apple care rep. He confirmed my suspition that it was software, not hardware as I have just had the logic board and power supply replaced.
His suggestions were to:
1. Run disk repair from the startup CD
try running OS X from a firewire drive and see if the same behavior happens or
perform and archive and install.
When the fan starts to run like that it means the OS is not communicating with the hardware properly. The OS could be somewhat corrupt if you were having hardware issues beforehand, hence the need for a reinstall. I will be performing an archive and install after the disk repair, I'll let you know if it fixes the problem!
iMac G5 Mac OS X (10.4.8)
Bad luck G5
Posts: 8
From: UK
Registered: Jan 10, 2007
Re: What's the problem? Display? Power supply? Cooling? My G5's gone mad
Posted: Jan 14, 2007 12:52 PM in response to: stopha6
Hi Stopha6,
Thank you for your message. I never imagined it could be a software issue, cos it looked so hardware.
Please keep me updated with your progress.
By the way, as I said in my old posts, a hard disk went dead when this happened for the very first time, how do you read this?
Thank you.
Songyan
iMac G5 Mac OS X (10.4.8)
Bad luck G5
Posts: 8
From: UK
Registered: Jan 10, 2007
Re: What's the problem? Display? Power supply? Cooling? My G5's gone mad
Posted: Jan 15, 2007 6:58 AM in response to: stopha6
Hi Stopha6,
After reading your reply again, I realized that the system had already been reinstalled. As I said when it happened for the first time, the hard disk died with it, which was replaced, of course with a new OS X, but the same problem is still happening. May this suggest that it is not just a software problem? Thank you. Songyan
iMac G5 Mac OS X (10.4.8)
AG-Nate
Posts: 5
From: Pismo Beach,CA
Registered: Aug 26, 2006
Re: What's the problem? Display? Power supply? Cooling? My G5's gone mad
Posted: Jan 14, 2007 3:38 PM in response to: Bad luck G5
The Fans going at full is only because you have an application that is using a lot of cpu power and therefore causing the imac to heat up so it turns the fans on. The screen-saver and sleep problem you describe sounds like something that may just happen on accident. But this sounds mostly like a software problem. Try making sure to always quit all non-apple products and see if anything changes.
eMac, iMacG5 Mac OS X (10.4.7) 800mhz 1gig ram, 2ghz 2gigs of ram
Bad luck G5
Posts: 8
From: UK
Registered: Jan 10, 2007
Re: What's the problem? Display? Power supply? Cooling? My G5's gone mad
Posted: Jan 15, 2007 6:50 AM in response to: AG-Nate
Thank you, Ag-Nate. I will try as you adivised but I con't think the fans were activeted my intensive CPU using. In most of the cases, the problems happened when the Mac was sleeping, when the minimum CPU were being used.
iMac G5 Mac OS X (10.4.8)
Timothy Klein
Posts: 15
From: Denver, CO, USA
Registered: Dec 6, 2004
Re: What's the problem? Display? Power supply? Cooling? My G5's gone mad
Posted: Jan 31, 2007 1:02 PM in response to: AG-Nate
"The Fans going at full is only because you have an application that is using a lot of cpu power and therefore causing the imac to heat up so it turns the fans on."
That's only partly right. A hard-working process will make the fans run at high speed, of course.
But, the OS is in touch with the firmware of the iMac, telling it how to run the fans, based upon information the OS X kernel is getting about the state of the hardware.
If the firmware loses touch with the OS for some reason, and is not getting instructions on how to run the fan, it will default to running them at full blast, to be on the safe side (and this "full blast" fan mode is way louder than anything you'll generally experience during normal usage, I know from experience).
So it may not be so simple as a hard-working cpu process kicking the fans on.
iMac G5 17" 1.6 GHz Rev. A Mac OS X (10.4.8) 1 GB Ram
Kensall
Posts: 2
From: London, England
Registered: Feb 2, 2007
Re: What's the problem? Display? Power supply? Cooling? My G5's gone mad
Posted: Feb 2, 2007 9:05 AM in response to: Timothy Klein
Hi I have a 20" G5 imac it's about 18 months old and I am having the same problem, It freezes and the fan runs really loud. It's nothing to do with software as my I.T. guy has done a complete re-install. All of our admin people have imacs of differring ages and the flat panels are all OK but every one of the G5s has had a booting problem. Some fell into the recall for replacement logic boards but the one I have at home is the newest and doesn't. I'm waiting for my apple reseller to get back to me, but it looks like it's the logic board and as none of the serial numbers fall into the recall, I'm expecting a big bill. I'm really disappointed as I've been a professional apple user for over 15 years and have grown to expect a certain amount of honesty and integrity from them. Looking at all of the discussion boards and the amount of people complaining of the same problem the logic boards are defective and apple should be replacing these free of charge.
i mac G5 Mac OS X (10.4.8)
a brody
Posts: 15,170
From: Silver Spring, Maryland. Don't forget to backup your data!
Registered: Dec 23, 2000
Re: What's the problem? Display? Power supply? Cooling? My G5's gone mad
Posted: Feb 2, 2007 10:27 AM in response to: Kensall
Kensall,
Welcome to Apple Discussions!
As in the other thread I wrote:
Being from England, you may find the repair program under these pages:
http://www.apple.com/uk/support/imac/repairextensionprogram/
http://www.apple.com/uk/support/imac/powersupply/repairextension/
Check both of them as they refer to different models.
If neither of yours is under the program, please start a new topic thread so someone can help you.
http://discussions.apple.com/forum.jspa?forumID=881
First off, you'll get a wider audience who may be able to solve your problem. Secondly, responses to you won't confuse the original poster with solutions that don't apply to them. And thirdly, you'll know for certain whether or not a response applies to you.
iMac C2D 2.17/20 inch/iMac G5 1.8 1st gen/iMac G4 800 Mac OS 9 Mac OS X (10.4.8) EyeTV 200, Canon PS A530 , Epson P-R220, iSight, Airport Extreme, 5th Gen iPod

I am having a very similar problem. My G5 imac has already had the logic board replaced from the leaking capacitor problem. 8 mos. later the power supply was replaced under the second recall program when it failed to start up.
It had been working now for almost a year, when about 3 mos. ago I started to experience the sudden dimming effect - if the display was untouched the screen would dim about 30% similar to a laptop in energy save mode. I checked and none of these types of options were set in the pref panes. At the same time I would have the iMac go to sleep after a while from non-use, and then when I tried to wake it it would stir for a few seconds and then go right back to sleep. It took 2-3 attempts to wake it up.
Then last week, as I tried to wake it, it just shut down instead completely. I had to hold the power button down to recycle it to get it to come back to life (3 times).
Today was it - I found what I thought was a sleeping iMac, but it will not power up at all. I opened the back cover and the power supply is working, but I cannot get the board to energize, I reset the PMU, but the #2 LED won't even blink. It is completely dead.
Basically every time I used this computer I held my breath that it would not work. After 2 recalls I still only get 9 mos. out of it? Apple is really starting to show it is like the "big" computer makers, the quality is going right down the tubes.
iMac G5 Mac OS X (10.4.4)

Macbook pro retina 15 mid-2012 display problem : solution :)

Well. This topic is not really a question, I hope this could be a solution for both users and Apple. Its free, but if Apple wants to offer me a full options Mac Pro, or hire me as consultant we can discuss ^^
The story is long, but is worth. Sorry in advance for my swissy english. I hope you'll enjoy.
As many of retina mid-2012 owners (and perhaps other versions) I encountered the symptom of my machine crashing more and more frequently (from once per week to more times per day). Crash usually with a message of "read error" or some display related crash dumps, often linked to the switching of graphic card (integrated<->dedicated).
For a long times a suspected some burnt chip (because of using 1-3 external screen all the day) and seeing istatmenu with crazy temperatures of 90-105°C. I was disappointed because of the evolving symptom (crashes more and more frequent and sometimes no display at power on)
It took me ages to discover what exactly did my MBPR crash, as it was crashing "randomly" for me. Sometimes after crashing, hard shutdown and restart, it wouldn't display or even power on the backlight, for one hour or one day and suddenly it would display again !!
I tried all the solutions found here and there including replacing the thermal paste, smc or pram reset -> no luck.
I took it to my local Apple provider and I was told I would have to change the motherboard. An expensive operation, since the warranty was expired by 2-3 months.
So I bought a 13 inchs retina as replacement and continued to diagnose my 15 inchs in parallel.
I discovered that it would crash if I bend it : Power on, one hand on each side applying a light bend in the two directions made my MBPR crash. So suddenly the problem wasn't random anymore. Mouhahahaha. This could be motherboard or chip related (de-soldered solderings here or there), or case related. Let's hope the problem's not mobo related.
I opened the case and tried to see in the dark if I could see a mini lightning when bending (because of a bad ground somewhere). -> No luck
So I tried to put paper here and there to try to locate the potential bad ground. Booting, bending, hard shutdowning, papering, booting, bending,...
And suddenly the darkness became light : If I put a paper at the right place, my MBPR will resist to the bend test. Was my mobo alive, and was this nightmare only a progressive bad ground ? Yes.
Here me good : the progressive symptom of random crashing of my MBPR (which I imputed for a long time to an old chip since the symptom was the same under windows 7 bootcamp + because of the graphic switching behaviour) was in fact only a bad contact at a very given place.
The very given place (my diagnose and my solution) ?
The screws of the left's fan (thunderbolt's side) or/and the fan case itself are screwed through the motherboard. For a reason (temperature, mecanic constraints or corrosion) this stuff entered in contact with each other, the redox gained the near electronic motherboard tracks (especially the thunderbolts one I guess).
Proof :
If I put a piece of paper between the motherboard and the case, I can bend my MBPR without it to crash and use it as before (except for external screens).
My diagnose :
once the material of the screw/fan case/motherboard track enter in direct contact, there is a corrosion effect that affects more and more the neighboor.
Here is a pic of my repair :
I can now :
play hours in windows 7 bootcamp
switch between graphic cards with gfxcardstatus (even with a playing itunes animation)
sleep and wake up with integrated or dedicated graphics
I can't :
connect a screen through thunderbolt since it activates the corosionned part of my MBPR, so it will work for a period of time but will assure me that a crash is awaiting (perhaps after a wake up or randomly from this time)
I'm confident that this problem is conceptual and that a big part of 15 inches retina mobo's exchanges are due to this question.
Hope this helps
Kisses from Switzerland

I tried to diagnose this mid 2012 retina 15 inchs for a couple of month now. With a very similar symptom of a lot of people :
some that exchanged the motherboard more times and experienced again the same freezes / shutdown again
some that installed mavericks by believing it workarounded the problem (but majority also says after a while that actually the problem was only differently reproduceable)
some hoping Apple to release a sowtware fix for that or a recall of the concerned machines
I now think to have isolated one of the cause of such symptoms. At beginning I thought that the fan electric insulation had worked but actually not.
Solution for me :
open the under case
dismount a bit the two fans
insert paper bands under the motherboard (between the black bottom and the motherboard, I used ~120gr/m2 paper and cut it into bands of 10-13cm by 2-3cm).
I would have dismounted the motherboard if I had the right screwdriver, but this seemed to be a too long/hard work, so I went into this idea that my motherboard was ok and that the problem was only caused by a supposed short-circuit under the motherboard.
My thoughts :
The more big the hole in the black tape under the motherboard, the more frequent the freezes / shutdown due to a short circuit (electronics grounded at the false place because of the mobo entering in contact with a grounded metal part through the black tape)
I also thinks this short circuit is more dedicated graphics linked than integrated and that this is the reason why the symptom persists or reappear even after multiple motherboard exchanges for a lot of people and the reason some people use their machine with forced integrated graphics
This solution should apply as self doable for a lot of people
If I should bet, I think that the black insulating tape under the keyboard is scratched by the time (mecanic constraints on the chassis) by some mobo component until a false contact is created through the insulating tape
I can now (mid-2012 retina 15 inchs I7 8go 256go, osx 10.10.2) :
run firefox or VLC with integrated or dedicated graphicssleep/wake with integraded or dedicated graphics (forced or auto-switching) with such programs runningrun multiple screens (2x TB + HDMI at the same time), sleep the machine, unplugging 1 of the 3 screens during the sleep, wake the machine + bending the machine during the process without it to crash. \o/
The goal of this post is to share this amazing experience with both Apple and the users facing such a problem.
Problem solved without motherboard exchange and with a quite easy workaround

Display problem, and maybe worse

On startup this morning my iMac (PowerPC) G5 display began behaving very strangely. The screen is displaying my usual desktop picture, dock and icons, and finder window. Applications are running, but very oddly.
The screen is covered in small visible dots, some flashing, some static. When I open a document, or a page in Safari, it displays more or less normally (I can use Word, for example), by then "smears" if I start to scroll down the page. At other times the graphics break up completely.
I'm guessing this is a display problem, but one other odd symptom is that sometimes if I click on a file in the Finder window, instead of opening the document the window shuts down and re-opens in its starting configuration.
I tried a restart, but it stuck on a black screen, and I had to force it to stop via holding the start button, and start again from there. I tried accessing system profiler, and it all froze up, requiring another button stop / start.
It looks like a hardware issue, but I've no idea what kind. Anybody recognise what is happening? (I'm posting this from my iBook).
Kenny

Since the update 10.9.4:
My soundcard is missing and on Safari 7.0.5 video artefacts and flickering.
On macbook Pro 13 Early 2011

Display Problem--Lines around icons and mouse

My Dell monitor attached to the Mac Mini recently shows faint lines and hatchings around the mouse curser, moving along with the cursor, and also appears around the header of the desktop, dock and the icons for folders,etc. When the screen goes in sleep mode and the screen saver comes on the resolution is really bad with these same lines cutting through the images. Furthermore, the drop down menu displays the same hatchings and lines but appears all over the menu.
I've tried resetting the resolution and that did not change it. I thought the computer got too hot and put it on top of an external fan pad, but the lines and hatchings are still there. I connected the monitor to my lab top and the lines and hatchings are not there.
Could this be a problem with the video card or ram?
Thanks for any suggestions and help.

Welcome to Apple Discussions!
While this could be a hardware fault, specifically the ATI video subsystem and it's 32Mb VRAM, it could also be something simple such as a connection in the video cable.
First thing to try is to unplug the video cable (and adapter if used), and the cable at the display end, and then reconnect everything,making sure it is very tightly reconnected. Once the system is rebooted, if the problem still exists, as a double check that it isn't the cabling, gently press down and sideways on the connectors to see if there is any change or flickering in the image. If there is, then the connectors may not be making a solid connection.
If the cabling isn't the problem, there are two things to try next:
Firstly, perform a PMU reset to ensure the video subsystem is being correctly powered.
To reset the PMU
- Unplug all cables from the computer, including the power cord.
- Wait 10 seconds.
- Plug in the power cord while simultaneously pressing and holding the power button on the back of the computer.
- Let go of the power button.
- Press the power button once more to start up your Mac mini.
If that doesn't resolve it, download and run YASU (it's available at www.versiontracker.com), setting it to perform all tasks except deleting cookies. Leave it to run, without using the system for anything else while it does it. This will clear out system caches and perform a range of other spring cleaning type activities and then force the system to reboot when done. The reboot will be slower than usual and the first few minutes afterwards the system will also be a little slow as it rebuilds the cache files, but this can often resolve odd behavioral problems of this sort.
If the problem persists after that, please post back.

IBook G4 Display Problem

I am having a display problem that looks exactly like the video link below:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oFzfdq3xMrI
What could be the cause of the problem?
Some possibilities:
If the display cable, how can this be replaced without taking the whole thing apart - is there a simpler way?
If a video card heatsink problem, is this an easy fix?
Many Thanks.

This appears to be a continuation of an issue you noted in September, as the
display had some problems then and after trying a few things, it seemed to be
stable at the time.
Perhaps the components involved with the iBook then are behind this problem.
Does not seem any easy path could be available to fix the problem, since the
parts most likely to be affecting or contributing to the symptom are deep enough
into the computer to require tedious disassembly effort. And odd screw locations.
Looking into the iFixit guide for iBook G4 12" 800MHz to 1.2GHz series build:
https://www.ifixit.com/Device/iBook_G4_12%22_800_MHz-1.2_GHz these
items may be weak or failing: the inverter, inverter/airport cables, and there
may be an indirect issue with the data display cable as they get bent & can
fail. The rolling & flickering image may be the inverter, but there are a few
components that essentially are not replaceable on the logic board that can
be the cause of display failure when these other items have not failed.
And a failing graphic processor or overheating may be contributory causes to
the symptoms. A complete diagnostic test, probably beyond most AASPs interest
may be required to troubleshoot the device accurately. So many don't want to fix
the older hardware, perhaps they're fearful of someone not willing to pay a lot to
have an older machine repaired. Hard to say...
You may need to enlist the aid of a specialist who restores and refurbishes
Apple portable computers and who has sufficient facilities to repair almost
everything in most any of these computer models... wegenermedia.com.
Since they have devised methods to fix these correctly & more efficiently
that may be a way to go. To call them &/or email after looking at their web
site can be helpful to discuss the matter and their processes of repair, etc.
Sorry to not be of much help, but in the process of locating correct service
and repair, you may also consider obtaining a second iBook or something
that can run the software of that vintage, to extend the usefulness of it.
Good luck & happy computing!

Odd Display Problems - Solved (& More...)

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