Display flashes to solid black intermittently

Same issues here in Austria.
Got my brand new mbpro and acd in late 2009 (october).

MacBookPro5,3
2,8 GHz
4 GB RAM

NVIDIA GeForce 9400M
NVIDIA GeForce 9600M GT


I experienced all issues (blackout, vertical stripe blinks, screen crambling) since the day of my purcase with both graphic cards. I also had a defect PSU, it produces a bugging ticking noise. Gladly this issue hab been fixed.
I also got problems with my second display at work, a Samsung 24" TFT connectet with the dvi-adapter from apple and my mbp. Sometimes the conection gets lost and the display starst snowing (if i wanted to see snow, i could also look out of the window - we got plenty here g).


The technican i am taking my ACD is not solving the issue at all. I also got during the first repair a shop ACD - got the same blinking and flashing issues.
Later that year he exchanged the logic board of the mbp, but that also didn't worked.
Now he wants to keep my mbp and ACD for 2 weeks, because he doesn't believe me anymore, even though i showed him pictures, videos and this discussion.
This is very disappointing, so i discontinued this hopeless efforts carring a huge display through the city making unwilling commercial for apple products...

240 replies . My friend has the same problem. After reading through these posts, my advice is to return it. Such an expensive display. The reason I buy Apple so I don't have to deal with getting thing just to work.
Return it.

Hello, For me some software or other issue is causing this problem. If I restart everything is fine for the rest of my day. I will try to figure out what program is causing this issue for me and advise.

Well guys, I have the issue too now.

Late '08 MBP, and a 24 inch ACD purchased in December '08. I had the logic board on the MBP replaced last week for a defective 9600 card, and so far all is running in top condition with the computer. This is the third night with it on the display since getting it back, and now my display is constantly flashing to a black screen just like everyone elses, maybe 2-7 times per minute, then it's fine for a few minutes, then it just flashes at will for a few more minutes.

I'm really sick of Apple's garbage products.

I live five hours from an Apple store which involves a car a bus a train and a subway to get to, and considering I just made three trips there and back (once to drop off the MBP, once to pick it up, and once more to bring it right back the next day since they didn't plug the keyboard backlight in to the logic board), there is NO WAY IN **** I am going to go back there again, lugging this huge pile of crap with me--absolutely not. I am absolutely infuriated right now.

I forgot to add--my display is PERFECT in terms of color/contrast and no backlight bleeding--I do NOT want another display because I probably won't get another one this good--but I want another power cable.

That said, this display was purchased in Japan, which means it only has a two pronged plug on the wall end--can someone with one from America verify if theirs has the third grounding plug or if there's is also just a two pin?

I'm on a Mac Pro (2009) with the Nvidia GT120 and also experience the flash to back problem on my Apple 24" LED display once in a while...

Cheers,
-Maik

wow, I thought I had it tough. I live about 20 miles from the closest apple store. I also had my LED taken in. After a week got a call that it was fixed. When I went back to pick it up, a genius tells me they were not able to reproduce the problem, the flashing black, but replaced the lcd panel and logic board anyway. I was just hopping whatever they did did fix the problem. When I got home and connected my macbook to the display, I got nothing! The speakers, the isight all work but the display is dead. Now my display is not intermittently flashing black but it is solid black at all times. In addition to that I have a small nick on the bottom right of the aluminum housing. It's no wonder they couldn't reproduce the problem. They tried to fix what they thought was not broken and broke it while at it.

Hey guy,

Apple Macpro 4,1 with led cinema display , same issue , with or without ups , try reset smc, pram, vram without effect .

Hi, guys!

Also have this problem. Absolutely new (2 weeks) MacBook Pro 13" + 24" Cinema LED. The blackout appears 4-5 times per day. This is my first mac and I'm very disappointed because the Apple products costs in Ukraine much more than in Europe and USA. I bought Cinema LED for $1350 and MBP 13" for $1750. It's a lot of money and I expected the maximum quality from Apple.

Wait till 10.6.3 update and than see what to do ...

I have the same issue. Normally it's just the occasional black screen for a few seconds, once or twice I've had to turn the power off to get my screen back, and the reason I searched for this thread was a pretty strange occurrence to me. I browsed a LOT of websites (I'm pretty dumb when using computers), lots of tabs open and hanging out, then I went through and closed everything in my web browser due to skipping music in VLC. I tried to move a song in the playlist, and the shadow of the name just stuck to my cursor. It wouldn't allow me to click on a thing, so I just let it hang out while it had the wait cursor going. Then the screen started flashing. In time with the music. I don't know, it could have been a steady flashing very similar to the beat of the music, but it pretty much freaked me out. After about 30 minutes of this, it chilled out and allowed me to use the computer again.

I wanted to describe this while it was fresh on my brain, but I plan to contact Apple like Steve Morris did (page 10).

I've had this problem on and off, switching to Better Performance in energy saving seems to have (for now) fixed the problem. So if you're reading this, try that first.

I am wondering how many people may have been using their DVD player just prior to the problem occurring? After having to send my +iMac G5+ in for a logic board replacement, I picked up a nice refurbished +PowerMac G5 2GHz DP+, with the +17" Apple LCD Studio Monitor+. For days everything had been going just great. Tonight, though, after using the DVD player, several things happened all at once. After installing a copy of AppleWorks onto my primary hard drive, while not necessary, I decided to reboot. After attempting a restart, the system came on, but would not convert to the operating system. All I could get it to do was to open up to the primary page, the one with the gray Apple symbol and the little spinning dial that shows the processor is running.

At first, I could not figure out where the problem might be, then realized that the only things different here from what I'd been doing was that, one, I had installed the word processing program, and, two, I had forgotten to remove the disk. I tried using the eject key on my Bluetooth keyboard, but to no effect, good or otherwise. I shut everything down, waited a few minutes, put on my trusty anti-static bracelet, then opened that beautiful aluminum door for the first time since buying the system.

Inside, I tried to find a disk release button on the drive, but to no avail. I then simply disconnected it, then tried to run the system again. This time it came on just fine. I tried doing it again, and the system converted properly and everything seemed just fine. I decided to risk things and shut it all down, then went back and reconnected the DVD drive so I could try to remove the installation disk. While I was pretty sure it wouldn't be that easy, to my great surprise, everything worked just fine. The disk ejected, and everything seemed just fine. Or so I thought. After about two minutes of use, the monitor went blank. It pulsed, going from fine to total blackness three to five times, then it all seemed fine again.

I used the computer for about five minutes when the blank pulsing started up again. I did all the obvious, which included resetting the Power Saver preference, making sure that I had not chosen to flash the screen in the "Hearing" section of the Universal Access preference, as well as running a full system check through Disk Utility. No matter what I did, the pulsing screen would eventually recur, although I must admit, resetting the Power Saver preference to "Highest" on the processor performance did seem to slow the pulsing significantly. The only thing that seems to have really stopped it, though, was to disconnect the DVD player, check the system, then go back and reconnect. Thankfully, with this machine, doing this is not a particularly challenging thing--- with some machines just testing the possibility would take some dedicated effort. Still, doing this seems to have worked for me, for now. I do not look forward to the next time I need to use the player, but at least I have some idea of what could potentially happen, and just what I'll need to do to attempt to reverse the problem again.

Having the problem with a Mac Pro, and the 24" LED Cinema. This problem is spread over enough different systems (iMacs, MBP, Macbooks, Mac Pros) that one cannot say it has anything to do with anything but the display. It is the only common factor. Am hauling mine in today, will see what happens...

Guess I'll add my ACD to the list... sigh Can't believe they haven't figured this out in over a year - and worse, continue in some cases to deny there is an issue!

MBP 15" and display bought in September last year, been flashing to black since I got it. Not usually too terrible, just very occasional random flashes. There are times, though where it will flash repeatedly multiple times per minute. (I have found unplugging and replugging does get it to stop for a while.) And then sometimes it won't do it for days...

There is absolutely nothing consistent about when it happens - might be an idle system, just browsing, watching a movie, you name it. Also, the MBP screen has never blinked (I usually run them both side by side).

Not at all keen to take the thing back to the Apple Store - my assumptions about the attitude I would receive are being verified by the replies in this thread, unfortunately. Just hoping they'll finally figure out the problem and I can simply get it fixed instead of playing games with them...

Ahh, the promising potential of an easy fix that means we all don't have to haul our monitors to an apple store to get it resolved. So how many others have found this (simple cable swap) to work?

My set up (MBA connected to 24inch), while never great, has gotten worse of late.

(Still, i should say that either unplugging and reconnecting the monitor to the laptop, or sleeping and awakening the laptop seems to "solve" the problem for the rest of the day.)