Second monitor blacks out occasionally

I plug a second monitor into my MacBookPro in the office (a 24" Apple LED). Maybe 2-4 times a day the second monitor only will go black for a second or so then come back. It also happens with other monitors as well. The laptop display has never done it.
I've had the motherboard replaced thinking it was a video processor issue, but the issue has occurred again after this switch.
Anybody have any idea what this might be?
Thanks.

Hi all
I did try that. No luck.. Strangely enough, I realized that when the server boots up, the login screen defaults to 85HZ refresh rate. I found a site that explains the plist file that you can change to force it to 60HZ. What is weird it if I boot the Mac connected to another LCD, then move the cable to the KVM, it works. It almost seems like when the mac is booting, it sends some sort of signal just before the login screen comes up, that screws up this KVM. Tried updating firmware, still in the process of speaking with the KVM support people...
very strange..
Enio

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Portg Z30-A-1E1 - External monitor blacks out randomly

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Monitor is powered all the time.
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Seems like a change of resolution or a reset - can the problem be in the graphic card? Otherwise maybe the HDMI port itself detecting strange stuff?
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Originally Posted by ammtosh
I would try the French service, Toshiba is an international company. If you have a problem with your Italian car in France you go to the French workshop...
Yes maybe you are right. Still, annoying not being a fluent French speaker to have to deal with them.... and with 90% possibility that they'll say "if you bought in Italy you should talk to them". I'll try.
PS: another ridiculous thing: you buy a product that has a problem, and you need to pay to call the support service? Really not acceptable....
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G5 HP Monitor blacks out, says No Input Signal

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I get the video back by either turning "Source" on the monitor off and then clicking it back on, or turning the monitor power off and then turning it back on. In either case, I'll usually get another five to eight minutes before the monitor blacks out again. If I repeat the process, the interval between blackouts gets shorter and shorter until I cave in, put the computer to sleep and come back in fifteen or twenty minutes, after which I get a pretty good run again, fifteen to twenty minutes. Because I do a lot of writing, it's a process of mental harrassment having my train of thought broken. I'm developing a flinch in anticipation, which sure don't make for limpid prose.
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Monitor blacks out when booting with KVM Switch in the middle

Hi
I have attached my Xserve with an iMac G5 to a KVM Switch. When I boot up the Xserve the monitor blacks out after the apple logo.
I know that the Xserve tries to autodetect the monitor. Apparently it fails in its job when the KVM is in the middle. Everything works well when I remove the KVM and connect the monitor directly to Xserve.
Any ideas how do I disable the monitor autodetect feature - or something?
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Hi all
I did try that. No luck.. Strangely enough, I realized that when the server boots up, the login screen defaults to 85HZ refresh rate. I found a site that explains the plist file that you can change to force it to 60HZ. What is weird it if I boot the Mac connected to another LCD, then move the cable to the KVM, it works. It almost seems like when the mac is booting, it sends some sort of signal just before the login screen comes up, that screws up this KVM. Tried updating firmware, still in the process of speaking with the KVM support people...
very strange..
Enio

External monitor blacks out

The external monitor I use with my MBP has stared blacking out - usually for about 30 seconds, sometimes more. Any ideas how I can fix it?

Originally Posted by ammtosh
I would try the French service, Toshiba is an international company. If you have a problem with your Italian car in France you go to the French workshop...
Yes maybe you are right. Still, annoying not being a fluent French speaker to have to deal with them.... and with 90% possibility that they'll say "if you bought in Italy you should talk to them". I'll try.
PS: another ridiculous thing: you buy a product that has a problem, and you need to pay to call the support service? Really not acceptable....
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Hi,
So your monitor is blacking out? Try your monitor and cable on another PC to eliminate those two items as possible failing ccomponents.
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Second screen blacked out when full screen with dual displays

I have a MacBook Pro connected to an LCD display. I use both screens. When working from home I'd like to have my local machine showing on the LCD monitor and my work machine showing in the MBP screen. I can do this, however I can't have the work machine in full screen mode because ARD blacks out my main LCD monitor. This frankly drives me nuts as there doesn't appear to be a preference within ARD to change this.
iTunes does the same thing. If I want to watch a video full screen in one monitor it blacks out the other. C'mon Apple, Quicktime doesn't do this and has a preferences tab just for display settings!
Does someone have a suggestion, work around, or want to point me to what I might be missing to solve this issue?

I understand what you are doing, but when you are running as full-screen the second display is blacked out because your making your station only the target at that moment. You are telling ARD that you want nothing to do with your Admin station. Also because the target doesn't have a second screen, your is blank. This avoids any confusion as to what screen belongs to what machine. ARD is working as it was designed to.
iTunes does the same thing to hid extra screens that are not part of the presentation so they don't detract from the show.
With your Observe or Control in Windowed mode, make the window of you client to fill the display as much as possible. This is the best you can do. Besides, when you are Controlling a client in Full-Screen, you can't move files and such with drag-n-drop. So if you want to work on both at the same time, you need to stay in windowed mode.
If you would like to make the petition to have your idea supported, do so here

Monitor blacking out and flickering MacPro1,1

MacPro1,1 2 x 3 GHz Dual-Core Intel Xeon, 3 GB 667 MHz DDR2 FB-DIMM, running Lion 10.7.5
Graphics NVIDIA GeForce 7300 GT 256 MB
For a couple of months now, my monitor periodically blacks out for a second and/or flickers. Sometimes it gets really bad and I just have to shut down.
There was some dust buildup inside machine; it has been cleaned, still having problem; have tried reseating video/graphics card.
I have run Apple Hardware Extensive Testing and it shows there are no problems; have checked and made sure monitor cord is securely connected.
Have monitored Temperatures and they all appear to be fine.
I CANNOT FIGURE THIS ONE OUT! IS THE VIDEO/GRAPHICS CARD ... MONITOR GOING BAD ... I AM AT A LOSS, AND IT IS REALLY IRRITATING.
CAN SOMEONE PLEASE HELP AND GIVE SOME INSIGHT?
THANKS SO MUCH!

Most graphics card that old have died of overheating a while ago.
RE: Mac Pro silver tower (2006-2012) Replacement Graphics cards
1) Apple brand cards,
2) "sold in the Apple store" cards, and
3) "Mac Edition" cards ...
... show all the screens, including Boot up screens, Safe Mode, Installer, Recovery, debug screens, and Alt/Option boot screens. At this writing, these choices include:
1) Apple brand cards:
• Apple-firmware 5770, about US$250** works near full speed in every model Mac Pro, Drivers in 10.6.5. (This card has just been discontinued and is no longer available from Apple dealers. There may be some new, old stock still available at resellers)
• Apple-firmware 5870, about US$450
2) "sold in the Apple store" cards
• NVIDIA Quadro 4000 Fermi, about US$1200
• NVIDIA Quadro K5000 Kepler, about US$2500
3) "Mac Edition" cards -- REQUIRE 10.8.3 or later:
• SAPPHIRE HD 7950 3GB GDDR5 MAC Edition, about US$480** Vendor recommends Mac Pro 4,1
• EVGA GTX 680 Mac Edition, about US$600
The cards above require no more than the provided two 6-pin aux power connectors provided in the Mac Pro through 2012 model. Aux cables may not be provided for third-party cards, but are readily available.
If you are Meet ALL of these:
• running 10.8.3 or later AND
• don't care about "no boot screens" etc AND
• can re-wire or otherwise "work out" the power cabling, THEN:
You can use many more cards, even most "PC-only cards".
One more thing--
Flashed PC cards: There are a good many EFI flashed cards that offer boot screens and behave like official cards. "for more information about using and flashing non-Apple cards, please check out the various sites like Netkas (and others) that focus on and discuss what is known and available. (Not supported or endorsed by Apple.)"

Second Monitor blinks out when in screen saver mode

I have and earlier Dual 2.5 G5 with ATI Radeon 9600 XT, 23 Cinema HD and Samsung 204T in portrait. Just hooked up the Samsung, and it's beautiful, but when it goes into Screen Saver mode with photos, after about 2 minutes, vertical black lines start flashing up, noise on the screen, then it blacks out for a second, comes back, and randomly blacks out monentarily. Once, it blacked out, and I had to reboot to get the screen to come back on. Seems like the video image is stressing the ATI card. No problems when just using the two monitors, only see this when in screen saver mode so far. Any thoughs our Ideas for cause and solution are welcome. Thanks.
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It sounds like preferences, log back into your normal account and check your Preferences Thoroughly;
• Navigate to ~(YourHome/Library/Preferences drag this folder to the desktop.
• Restart and test your applications.
• If this works, save the old preferences folder somewhere else or on disk, name it "old prefs" .
** Note: A very important file is the "com.apple.Mail.plist" preference file located in the Preferences folder which contains all email account settings and general mail preferences (hold this one and replace if your problem is not with Mail).
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-mj
[email protected]

Monitor blacking out

I just hooked up a 20.1 Samsung SyncMaster 204b monitor. I believe it is a DVI hookup as it plugs directly into card without mac adapter. I and am having trouble with it blacking out. I was looking thru some pics in Preview and certain pics would cause it to go black. Some emails make it react the same way. The list goes on and on. I am concerned as I have a Catalog I will be working on which is Photoshop intensive and don't want to have this thing go down. I was wondering if it is the card. Looks like it only has 32mb ram...Is there a certain type of card I s/b looking for?
I was on tigerdirect looking at a
XFX GeForce 6800 Xtreme / 256MB GDDR3 / AGP 8x / Dual DVI / HDTV / Video Card
My ? is will this work. What is PCIExpress? Will this work as well?
Thanx in advance for all input...
G4 mirrored doors Mac OS X (10.2.x) NVidia-GE Force 4mx Card
G4 mirrored doors Mac OS X (10.2.x)

I have figured this one out. I went to OWC and did some research. I ended up ordering the 9600 that was reconfigured specifically for my MDD PowerMac G4
Thanx, rog

Samsung monitor blacks out

I've been using a Samsung monitor with my 2008 MacBook Pro, running Lion for a couple of years now - it's been rock-solid stable. I use the Samsung as main monitor with laptop as secondary.
Past couple of days, the Samsung has been blacking out - seemingly NOT triggered by anything. If I unplug the cable at MacBook end and replug immediately, everything is fine. I have tried restarting, PRAM reset, Permission repair, etc. Things are hot here in New England at the moment, but stats on heat and fan speed look fine on iStat Pro (the immediate deplug/replug suggests its not a heat thing anyway).
Thanks for any and all thoughts,
Vince
Here's the Console Log from the time when it last happened:
7/6/13 8:23:24.436 PM Activity Monitor: kCGErrorIllegalArgument: CGSGetDisplayBounds: Invalid display 0x0b4156b1
7/6/13 8:23:24.436 PM Activity Monitor: kCGErrorFailure: Set a breakpoint @ CGErrorBreakpoint() to catch errors as they are logged.
7/6/13 8:23:24.436 PM Activity Monitor: _NXGetScreenRect: error getting display bounds (1001)
7/6/13 8:23:24.436 PM Activity Monitor: kCGErrorIllegalArgument: CGSGetDisplayBounds: Invalid display 0x0b4156b1
7/6/13 8:23:24.436 PM Activity Monitor: _NXGetScreenRect: error getting display bounds (1001)
7/6/13 8:23:24.436 PM Activity Monitor: kCGErrorIllegalArgument: CGSGetDisplayBounds: Invalid display 0x0b4156b1
7/6/13 8:23:24.437 PM Activity Monitor: _NXGetScreenRect: error getting display bounds (1001)
7/6/13 8:23:24.437 PM Activity Monitor: kCGErrorIllegalArgument: CGSGetDisplayBounds: Invalid display 0x0b4156b1
7/6/13 8:23:24.437 PM Activity Monitor: _NXGetScreenRect: error getting display bounds (1001)
7/6/13 8:23:24.438 PM Activity Monitor: kCGErrorIllegalArgument: CGSGetDisplayBounds: Invalid display 0x0b4156b1
7/6/13 8:23:24.438 PM Activity Monitor: _NXGetScreenRect: error getting display bounds (1001)
7/6/13 8:23:24.438 PM Activity Monitor: kCGErrorIllegalArgument: CGSGetDisplayBounds: Invalid display 0x0b4156b1
7/6/13 8:23:24.438 PM Activity Monitor: _NXGetScreenRect: error getting display bounds (1001)
7/6/13 8:23:24.439 PM Activity Monitor: kCGErrorIllegalArgument: CGSGetDisplayBounds: Invalid display 0x0b4156b1
7/6/13 8:23:24.439 PM Activity Monitor: _NXGetScreenRect: error getting display bounds (1001)
7/6/13 8:23:24.439 PM Activity Monitor: kCGErrorIllegalArgument: CGSGetDisplayBounds: Invalid display 0x0b4156b1
7/6/13 8:23:24.439 PM Activity Monitor: _NXGetScreenRect: error getting display bounds (1001)
7/6/13 8:23:24.440 PM Activity Monitor: kCGErrorIllegalArgument: CGSGetDisplayBounds: Invalid display 0x0b4156b1
7/6/13 8:23:24.440 PM Activity Monitor: _NXGetScreenRect: error getting display bounds (1001)
7/6/13 8:23:24.440 PM Activity Monitor: kCGErrorIllegalArgument: CGSGetDisplayBounds: Invalid display 0x0b4156b1
7/6/13 8:23:24.440 PM Activity Monitor: _NXGetScreenRect: error getting display bounds (1001)
7/6/13 8:23:24.441 PM Activity Monitor: kCGErrorIllegalArgument: CGSGetDisplayBounds: Invalid display 0x0b4156b1
7/6/13 8:23:24.441 PM Activity Monitor: _NXGetScreenRect: error getting display bounds (1001)
7/6/13 8:23:24.441 PM Activity Monitor: kCGErrorIllegalArgument: CGSGetDisplayBounds: Invalid display 0x0b4156b1
7/6/13 8:23:24.441 PM Activity Monitor: _NXGetScreenRect: error getting display bounds (1001)
7/6/13 8:23:24.441 PM Activity Monitor: kCGErrorIllegalArgument: CGSGetDisplayBounds: Invalid display 0x0b4156b1
7/6/13 8:23:24.441 PM Activity Monitor: _NXGetScreenRect: error getting display bounds (1001)
7/6/13 8:23:24.442 PM Activity Monitor: kCGErrorIllegalArgument: CGSGetDisplayBounds: Invalid display 0x0b4156b1
7/6/13 8:23:24.442 PM Activity Monitor: _NXGetScreenRect: error getting display bounds (1001)
7/6/13 8:23:24.442 PM Activity Monitor: kCGErrorIllegalArgument: CGSGetDisplayBounds: Invalid display 0x0b4156b1
7/6/13 8:23:24.442 PM Activity Monitor: _NXGetScreenRect: error getting display bounds (1001)
7/6/13 8:23:24.442 PM Activity Monitor: kCGErrorIllegalArgument: CGSGetDisplayBounds: Invalid display 0x0b4156b1
7/6/13 8:23:24.479 PM Activity Monitor: _NXGetScreenRect: error getting display bounds (1001)
7/6/13 8:23:24.480 PM Activity Monitor: kCGErrorIllegalArgument: CGSGetDisplayBounds: Invalid display 0x0b4156b1
7/6/13 8:23:24.480 PM Activity Monitor: _NXGetScreenRect: error getting display bounds (1001)
7/6/13 8:23:24.480 PM Activity Monitor: kCGErrorIllegalArgument: CGSGetDisplayBounds: Invalid display 0x0b4156b1
7/6/13 8:23:24.480 PM Activity Monitor: _NXGetScreenRect: error getting display bounds (1001)
7/6/13 8:23:24.480 PM Activity Monitor: kCGErrorIllegalArgument: CGSGetDisplayBounds: Invalid display 0x0b4156b1
7/6/13 8:23:24.480 PM Activity Monitor: _NXGetScreenRect: error getting display bounds (1001)
7/6/13 8:23:24.711 PM loginwindow: kCGErrorIllegalArgument: CGSGetDisplayBounds: Invalid display 0x0b4156b1
7/6/13 8:23:24.711 PM loginwindow: kCGErrorFailure: Set a breakpoint @ CGErrorBreakpoint() to catch errors as they are logged.
7/6/13 8:23:24.712 PM loginwindow: _NXGetScreenRect: error getting display bounds (1001)

Did some further troubleshooting today, and wanted to share for anyone looking for solutions.
Tried both DVI and DVI-RGB connections (different cables) on the Syncmaster monitor and symptoms were the same.
Tried DVI-RGB into my Epson EX5200 projector - NO SYMPTOMS.
Did some further digging, and there are reports of the Samsung Syncmaster 2333SW doing this with PlayStation, Television, etc. No resolution other than monitor hardware malfunction
Bottom line - this is not an OS X, MacBook Pro issue.
Vince

Monitor blacks out

My Imac was brought to repair and maintenance, and declared "in good working order".
Unfortunately I still get black screens. The temperature during black out was as shown below.
Don't think this is in any way problematic (I have seen much higher temperatures)...?
Has anyone suggestions what I could do?
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Temperature sure is OK. You have seen the other topics on this subject, like this one, I suppose? Looks like a difficult to diagnose issue...

Toshiba Satellite monitor blacks out...CRASHES..Randomly..help!!

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Are you able to determine whether the machine has locked up or is it just the monitor does not come back on. I had a machine that when docked, when the monitor power timed out and turned off the monitor, it would not turn it back on. I realized that the OS was still up and running, so I could "keystroke" <Alt>+<F4>, restart the machine, which was the only way to get the monitor back on. Does this seem to occur at some set interval or period of inactivity. You might first try disabling all monitor and power saving setting and even disable any screen saver to see if this helps. If not, reboot the machine into "safe-mode" and see if you can reproduce the error. At least this would strongly suggest a software issue. If you cannot reproduce the error in "safe-mode", next try removing as much as you can from startup and then do a normal boot and see it if re-occurs.
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Monitor blacks out while using

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Check out this thread:
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=7393107&#7393107
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Second monitor blacks out occasionally

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