Display flashes to solid black intermittently

This evening I updated my original post with this information.

I spoke with a 3rd product specialist today and he said that this is indeed a known issue and he could not understand why previous specialists told me otherwise. He said it will be escalated to the proper departments and that I should call him direct on Thursday if I do not hear from him sooner. Well I feel a bit better not that the problem is fixed and it known and being worked on. I have never had an issue that has not been resolved since 1989 and trust that apple will come through on this one as always.

BTW today I could not make the monitor blink once. It never happens when you want it too.

Same as cars. You bring it into the shop and the problem is gone until you get home.

Is there anyone out there with the exact problem?

Here is another video of the problem from Youtube. I can't imagine apple has not seen these.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGjoyiGyHmE&feature=channel_page

*AN UPDATE ON THE ISSUE.*



This morning I spoke to another product specialist that was well aware of this issue. I was also informed that apple is already working on this exact issue and there is not reason to return monitors or computers as it is a known issue and not your single unit. If you have a good monitor with no dead pixels or dust under the glass by all means do not bring it back only to go into the monitor nightmare I have read about. Of course you have to remember out of the millions of people with perfect monitors the bad ones are few and far between. Have you ever bought a new car that had a few things that had to be fixed. It's always one little thing or another. Generally the people with no problems don't make posts. This is what magnifies issues to the few people that do have minor issues. The monitor blinking is a widespread issue though and it will be resolved so we must try to live with it until apple comes out with the fix. Personally I am glad I didn't return my computer only to end up with one with another problem. I hope my research and time put into this will make lots of people rest easy and stop worrying about this issue as I have. As far as all the first time mac users, RELAX guys. You shouldn't even think of going back to a PC. Sometimes you are in the position that you must buy a computer at the time a new line is introduced and there are usually a few issues that have to be ironed out with a new product. Especially one that has been re-designed completely as this MacBook Pro has. *Stick with your mac and in time you will never want to go back.* Trust me!

The problems are not in the displays. If you got a good display without any dead pixels I would keep it. The problem is in the software or the computer and the display combined. I have no problem with just using the macbook by itself. Do you?

If your display goes black you can go to the prefs and click "detect displays". You can also select show display on menu bar in the display prefs and you can do it from there.

Do your screens go black while you are working or when you are away from the computer? Possibly they are going to sleep and you are waking them up. try going to the preferences and extending your display sleep times. A click of the keyboard or mouse will always wake the computer up. The dimming is built into all books to save energy. That can also be turned off in the prefs if you don't want it but it is for saving the battery.

Sometimes when you open the Macbook after it is closed while you are working you have to activate it and detect displays does that. I have had that happen a few times. Not a defect.

I would disconnect the computer from the monitor and use it without it for a day or so and see if the computer has any issues. If the computer is working fine then hook it back up and what I have found is the power saving mode is basically only for when you are using the battery. Use the Better Performance when plugged into the electricity and visa versa and see if the improves things. It has for me. I have gone 2 days with no problem.

Honestly I was worried about this whole thing for a few weeks but I have talked to a number of people and after seeing all the display problem I have decided to keep everything as it is and it will be resolved.

The most important thing is to get the extended warranty before your year is up. If something goes wrong around the third year is might cost as much to fix as the resale amount of the computer thus not being worth fixing. More important than that is to use a very good surge protector as each surge over the years even if they are small will shorten the life of you device.

I totally do not recommend returning the monitor. The problem will be resolved. If your book alone while not connected is doing anything strange I would take that in and get a new one. Talk to a product specialist at apple and tell him you don't want the defective book and want a replacement.

There is also one more thing you can do.
unplug everything. Take out the battery. wait about 5 minutes. Press the power button for 5 seconds and that resets the computer. That might take care of the issue. Put the battery back in and restart. See if that resolves anything.

Let me know if you have any other questions. 🙂

one more thing. never listen to the first person you talk to when calling apple. They don't have the knowledge of the upper level product specialists. They know about 2 things. Go to the Genius bar or reformat your harddrive. You can end up erasing your entire hard drive if you listen to them and it might be as simple and a bad file or something. Always try to get to the next level product specialist before doing anything major.

I thought the better performance was the answer as well. Guess What? I have been on better performance now for a few days and it started flashing this afternoon and not once or twice but for about 20 minutes at least once a minute now with another flash happening around the dock on a few occasions. Being that only MacBook Pro 2.53's seem to be the computer with the problem I really don't think it is the monitor. I had my monitor replaced as it had a dead pixel. Both the old one and the new one blink and flash. Apple still has no clue or they would have fixed it already. They came out with a fix by dumping 2 of the preferences. Didn't work. Well today I was loaded with work and decided enough is enough. Told apple i am not going to be a test subject or a guinea pig while they try and figure out what they did wrong. They are sending me a new 2.66 Monday, but I have been on the phone with a product specialist for many weeks now. Hopefully the problem will be gone. I can't imagine every single MacBook does this. We shall see.