Ashadur

Q: 27' iMac (2011) Screen turns off

This has been going on for me for the past few months on and off, it just randomly switches the screen off but everything else works perfectly, for example if im watching a video on hulu i can still hear the sound, if im doing work on word the documents are still there, iv finally gotten video footage of it.

 

Screen turning off:

http://youtu.be/l6DfD7o_fXs

 

Screenshot of my settings

http://i.imgur.com/pPvUH.jpg

 

To turn it back on i press "ctrl + shift + eject" and then move the mouse.

 

Any help will do, i have contacted Apple support on the phone they did say bring it in, just need to make an appointment. If anyone else has this problem and knows a better solution than having to keep pressing buttons to turn the screen back on please share.

 

Thank you in advance

- Ashadur

iPhone 4S, iOS 5

Posted on Jun 27, 2012 3:39 PM

Close

Q: 27' iMac (2011) Screen turns off

  • All replies
  • Helpful answers

first Previous Page 11 of 16 last Next
  • by mrbofus,

    mrbofus mrbofus Jan 15, 2014 9:14 AM in response to mrbofus
    Level 1 (17 points)
    Mac OS X
    Jan 15, 2014 9:14 AM in response to mrbofus

    Aaaaaand, the problem has returned for me.  #*%&#@*(@(!*@*$#)@((@&$^

  • by mrbofus,

    mrbofus mrbofus Jan 17, 2014 12:43 PM in response to mrbofus
    Level 1 (17 points)
    Mac OS X
    Jan 17, 2014 12:43 PM in response to mrbofus

    If anything, the problem is now worse for me.  My current and previous energy settings are that the computer never sleeps and that the displays turn off after 30 minutes. Previously, at least if I stopped my system from sleeping, the iMac display would work until the next restart, meaning I could get at least a few weeks of use on all the displays.  Currently, the iMac display never turns on when I start working on the computer, even though the system wasn't sleeping (the displays turn off but the computer doesn't go to sleep, which is the same setting as before I did the clean install).  The iMac display will turn on at some random point (usually after I've been using the computer for an hour or more) and then stay on, but once the display turns off (overnight, for example), it won't turn on again for at least an hour after I start using the computer again.

  • by Sunfiresaturn,

    Sunfiresaturn Sunfiresaturn Jan 19, 2014 5:03 PM in response to Ashadur
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jan 19, 2014 5:03 PM in response to Ashadur

    All of your symptoms were indentical to mine and I tried EVERYTHING to fix it.

     

    My realization?

     

    RAM


    I have 4 slots open in my 2010 - iMac

     

    2x2GB DDR3-10600
    2x4GB DDR3-10666

     

    For some reason, my iMac couldn't handle both together. At first I thought it was the 10666, but then tried both RAM types separately, and both work.

     

    I guess you shouldn't pair 10600 with 10666 - or at least different ram sizes.

     

    I am going for 4x4GB 10666 now.

     

    I hope this helps everyone because I was losing my mind for a short while.

     

    iMac is happy and on full brightness.

     

    Life is good.

  • by HenkRoodt,

    HenkRoodt HenkRoodt Feb 11, 2014 6:11 PM in response to Ashadur
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Feb 11, 2014 6:11 PM in response to Ashadur

    Well, I used my Apple Care and the whole screen and display electronics were replaced.  The system is now working as expected.

    Nothing else seemed to work.

  • by mrbofus,

    mrbofus mrbofus Feb 12, 2014 1:13 AM in response to Sunfiresaturn
    Level 1 (17 points)
    Mac OS X
    Feb 12, 2014 1:13 AM in response to Sunfiresaturn

    Sunfiresaturn wrote:

     

    All of your symptoms were indentical to mine and I tried EVERYTHING to fix it.

     

    My realization?

     

    RAM


    I have 4 slots open in my 2010 - iMac

     

    2x2GB DDR3-10600
    2x4GB DDR3-10666

     

    For some reason, my iMac couldn't handle both together. At first I thought it was the 10666, but then tried both RAM types separately, and both work.

     

    I guess you shouldn't pair 10600 with 10666 - or at least different ram sizes.

     

    I am going for 4x4GB 10666 now.

     

    I hope this helps everyone because I was losing my mind for a short while.

     

    iMac is happy and on full brightness.

     

    Life is good.

     

    Being desperate, I decided to try your solution so I bought 2x8GB sticks and replaced the RAM in my iMac.  So far, so good!!    It's been about two weeks now and I've been running it with the computer not goign to sleep at all.  Starting next week, I think I'm going to try to have it go to sleep after inactivity, which is how it was before this whole saga started.

     

    I never would have thought about the RAM being the culprit.  Thank you SOOOOOO much for your post!!!

  • by micknorfolk,

    micknorfolk micknorfolk Feb 12, 2014 3:33 AM in response to Kokoglace
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Desktops
    Feb 12, 2014 3:33 AM in response to Kokoglace

    I had a similar problem to many on the issue, including yourself, of the screen shutting down randomly. It would just go blank, sometimes with very thin green vertical lines visible but not always. I booked an appointment with Apple and duly took my 27 - inch, Mid 2011 iMac to the store. The Genious hooked my machine up to thier 'test kit' and ran a diagnostioc check which took a couple of minutes. The result was that there was an isue identified with the graphics card. The Genious explained that there were problems with some cards on machines built at this time and said it needed replacing. I agreed to this and left my Mac with them. I collected 7 days later, no charge, all is now fine. Incidentally this is my fifth Mac and only the 3rd hardware issue that I have had in 26 years!

     

    Hope this helps.

  • by Max By,

    Max By Max By Feb 22, 2014 1:12 PM in response to Ashadur
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Feb 22, 2014 1:12 PM in response to Ashadur

    Same problem,

    Someone has got news or solutions ?

  • by mrbofus,

    mrbofus mrbofus Feb 22, 2014 10:02 PM in response to Max By
    Level 1 (17 points)
    Mac OS X
    Feb 22, 2014 10:02 PM in response to Max By

    Max By wrote:

     

    Same problem,

    Someone has got news or solutions ?

     

    Have you tried the various methods mentioned in the thread?  Replace RAM?  Replace GPU if it falls under the replacement program?  Replace LCD if under AppleCare? 

  • by llubnrut,

    llubnrut llubnrut Feb 22, 2014 10:09 PM in response to mrbofus
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Feb 22, 2014 10:09 PM in response to mrbofus

    My mid 2011 27" has so far been at the genious bar 3 times.

     

    1. Blamed non App Store software, wiped my drive.

     

    2. Replaced my video card under the quality program.

     

    3. Replaced LCD panel.

     

    Only had it back a couple of weeks and today the back light turned off again whilst in the middle of watching a video clip.

     

    Getting really tired if all this. The problem has been the same for over a year now but thankfully Apple has not yet charged my a cent. They have in fact been really helpful.

  • by mrbofus,

    mrbofus mrbofus Feb 22, 2014 10:17 PM in response to llubnrut
    Level 1 (17 points)
    Mac OS X
    Feb 22, 2014 10:17 PM in response to llubnrut

    llubnrut wrote:

     

    My mid 2011 27" has so far been at the genious bar 3 times.

     

    1. Blamed non App Store software, wiped my drive.

     

    2. Replaced my video card under the quality program.

     

    3. Replaced LCD panel.

     

    Only had it back a couple of weeks and today the back light turned off again whilst in the middle of watching a video clip.

     

    Getting really tired if all this. The problem has been the same for over a year now but thankfully Apple has not yet charged my a cent. They have in fact been really helpful.

     

    Have you tried changing the RAM?  Sunfiresaturn mentioned it fixed the problem last month and I posted two weeks ago that it fixed the issue for me.

  • by Jah_Daffodil,

    Jah_Daffodil Jah_Daffodil Mar 31, 2014 1:00 AM in response to mrbofus
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Mar 31, 2014 1:00 AM in response to mrbofus

    Hello !

     

    I sadly join the "black screen but iMac still running" club with my mid-2011 iMac 27 (3,1ghz / HD 6970m). The issue appeared for the first time immediatly after I upgraded to Mavericks :

     

    - the screen shutdown after 10-20 min when I'm running Mavericks

    - the screen shutdown after 30min - 1h when I'm playing demanding games under windows 8,1 / Bootcamp

     

    My guess is that it is linked to my upgrade from Lion to Mavericks (it never happened before) and it is somewhat linked to the temparature (the mac gets hot, I can feel it whith my hand, but the fans won't speed up like they did before the upgrade).

     

    So I will try to remove 4go of RAM (I added 4 go to the 4 go that were sold with the iMac), but I'm not convinced it´s the source of the trouble since they're in the iMac almost since the beginning, and the screen shutdown appeared only 10 days ago when I installed Mavericks.

     

    I qualify to the 6970m replacement program, so that may be a lead too.

     

    One more thing : I installed Macericks (clean) on the internal HDD, but before, I was using an external thunderbolt SSD to run Bootcamp. Maybe it is linked too but I doubt it.

     

    Daffodil

  • by mrbofus,

    mrbofus mrbofus Mar 31, 2014 1:26 AM in response to Jah_Daffodil
    Level 1 (17 points)
    Mac OS X
    Mar 31, 2014 1:26 AM in response to Jah_Daffodil

    @Jah_Daffodil:

     

    Please do report back and let us know if the RAM was the culprit.  If not, any other attempts/fixes would be greatly appreciated, thanks!

     

    On a side note, it has been almost two months now, and I haven't had any issues with the screen going black.  It looks like it was the RAM for me.  Which is still odd, because the issues coincided with me upgrading to Mountain Lion, but I guess it was just a coincidence.

  • by MarkusWinter,

    MarkusWinter MarkusWinter Mar 31, 2014 2:46 PM in response to mrbofus
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Mar 31, 2014 2:46 PM in response to mrbofus

    RAM being the culprit is less unlikely than you might think. Mavericks has a LOT of new technologies (like compressed memory) and is more demanding on the RAM than previous systems.

     

    That he also experiences the problem under BootCamp points to a hardware problem. Not sure if Win8 is also more demanding.

     

    It should be pointed out that there seem to be several causes of the problem:

     

    (1) the screen really goes off (you CANNOT see a faint image when shining a light on it).

     

    (2) The backlight goes off (you CAN still see a faint image when shining a light on it).

     

    If you are in the second category then it could still be lots of things.

     

    If it happens after you installed Mavericks then try to go back to an earlier version and see if this makes a difference. However given how many millions of people installed Mavericks some are bound to experience the problem shortly after upgrading anyway. If you can't go back then try other RAM (like removing third party RAM and trying the Apple RAM).

     

    Some experience it after a hardware upgrade - the problem started for me after the harddisk was exchanged as part of the Seagate Harddisk exchange program. I suspect a pin on the video cable got bend as another user posted.

     

    Whatever it is - write to Apple. Just venting/moaning/complaining/crying here on the forum might make you feel better, but it doesn't change anything.

     

    But be polite in your email. Rude ones go straight to the bin.

     

    <Email Edited By Host>

     

     

  • by Jah_Daffodil,

    Jah_Daffodil Jah_Daffodil Mar 31, 2014 2:33 AM in response to MarkusWinter
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Mar 31, 2014 2:33 AM in response to MarkusWinter

    Hello, thank for your advices. I'm not moaning nor crying, I'm just here to share my experiences and help people to find a solution if anything works for me (I'll try things in the next 15 days).

     

    I'm not sure RAM is the culprits, because like you said, I used Bootcamp windows 8,1 before upgrading to Mavericks without any trouble (with the same RAM). So if Mavericks doesn't change anything to the RAM management under bootcamp, that´s something else, like the fans which don't speed up anymore. Maybe when the fans are about to speed up, it shuts down my screen (but it doesn't prevent iTunes to play music actually).

     

    I'll keep in touch,

     

    Daffodil

  • by Jah_Daffodil,

    Jah_Daffodil Jah_Daffodil Apr 6, 2014 6:18 AM in response to Jah_Daffodil
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Apr 6, 2014 6:18 AM in response to Jah_Daffodil

    Hello guys,

     

    I think I might have some answers. I tried different things :

     

    1) I downgraded from Mavericks to Mountain Lion -> black screen even sooner;

    2) Test my 4x2 Go of RAM = I'm able to run the iMAc longer with 4 go of RAM than with 8go before any black screen;

    3) The black screen happens when I plug a USB device;

    4) The black screen happens later when I'm on low brightness;

    5) The black screen began when I reinstalled the OS on the internal HDD instead of the external SSD

     

    Now I'm pretty sur that it is related to power supply, because (if you read my previous post) I also switched to the internal drive when I upgraded to Mavericks, instead of my low power consomption external SSD. And I think it's the culprit : it's wasn't Mavericks, it was switching the installation of the OS to the internal HDD (which demand higher power supply than the 3 w thunderbolt SSD).

     

    And I'm sur that if I manage to decrease the energy consomption of the iMac, I it should not shut off the screen anymore. Any idea ?

     

    Daffodil

first Previous Page 11 of 16 last Next