Q: New iMac 27inch screen flickering/tearing/shutoff

Elroyofderovers, good point. I should have done the same, but it's apple's problem, i paid -> they MUST give me a good one. Keeping the faulty imac is like saying "it has some problems...but...it's ok..".

I know... they don't care about me, but for me it's a respect-thing.

I can't complain about the support. It's quick and simpel.

This time i didn't migrate from my timemachine.. i'm thinking the problem is indeed the software.

Message was edited by: Gille_Belgium

Folks have reported seeing this on Apple retail store models.

Out of interest and further to comments with regard the power supply - does everyone's power supply connection on the back of the 27" i7 fit flush?

Reason I ask is that I also own a 24" 2.8GHz Core 2 Duo and find the power supply entry socket in the back is a very snug flush easy fit - a perfect connection! However, the first 27" i7 bought was not so snug and took some wiggling to achieve a semi flush fit. The second 27" i7 (replacement) was surprisingly easier to connect than the first (no wiggle required), though still does not remain completely flush - edges are slightly raised from the back panel.

*Quick update on my situation:*

• 1st 27" i7 - flicker and blackout 6hours into boot up straight out of box and continued for two days before I returned for replacement..

• 2nd 27" i7 (John Lewis UK replacement from same batch of Macs) - no symptoms for 5 days. On the 6th day experienced severe flicker, blackout and dock shift (caught on camera) all within a period of 15mins. I proceeded with a straight forward restart, and the screen has been fine since (now been 3 days)!

All that has been installed on both glitchy machines is Microsoft Office 2008, Photoshop CS4, Illustrator CS4, Skype & Firefox. Migration assistant has not been used.

I would be interested to know the production date of the earlier iMacs as opposed to the recent ones with less issues. Not to question or insult anyones knowledge...but in your serial number the the third digit "9" represents the year 2009, the next two after that represent the week in 2009 it was produced, in my case it is "46" which is the week of Nov 8-14th. Are people with earlier production dates having more issues and are the newer macs showing signs of improvement. The sad part is that once the issue is solved for an individual...they just stop reading threads like these...we need to stick with this not just for our own machines but to help people who have helped us and are still having problems.

Did anyone see this problem on a system that was not allowed to go to sleep? I only see this when I wake the system from sleep. If I restart it, I can work on it all day without a hint of a flicker.

My guess is when waking from sleep the video hardware is not properly re-initialized, which would make this a software rather than a hardware problem.

Hello,

FWIW, a little historical and personal perspective. My first iMac was a 1.8GHZ, 17" G5 machine purchased in Jan 05. Less than a year into it, the motherboard had to be replaced due to video issues related to faulty capacitors on the motherboard. This was a well know industry problem which affected many manufactures, not just Apple. Apple was great and replaced the motherboards no questions asked, and in fact instituted a 3 year extended warranty on the motherboards for these models. The good thing was on the G5 it was easy to open the back side and see for yourself if you had bad capacitors. After 2 years, 3 months with this computer, I opened the back and saw that the capacitors had failed again and although I had no video malfunctions at the time, Apple replaced my computer with the latest Intel C2D computer in Mar 07 free of charge under my Apple Care . This is my case to all for Apple Care. Definitely worth the money.

I am close to selling my 24" 2.16 GHz and upgrading to the new i7 so I'm watching this very closely. Does the back come off this new model easily, or is it like all the other Alum iMacs? It would not surprise me if this issue too is related to capacitor issues.

My experience with the iMac has been a little rocky, but I think it is a much better computer than any previous PC I owned. OSX is untouchable by Windows in my humble opinion.

Best of Luck All.....Nano

Been using my iMac now for about a day. I opened a VMWare Fusion image located on a external disk connected through FireWire. Because it was the first time I opened it on the new iMac, I got a message saying that 3D Acceleration was turned of, and that I had to reboot the virtual Windows XP machine in order to benefit of 3D Acceleration. When using the virtual machine I saw colored lines flashing on the entire iMac screen exactly the same as shown in some videos on this thread. The screen went blank for a second and then returned. Reading this thread I became worried of course. But I shut down the virtual machine, rebooted my iMac and started my virtual machine, with the 3D acceleration switched on. Since then I have not seen the problem anymore. Hopefully it stays that way. By the way, can I reset the PRAM using a wireless bluetooth keyboard?

Just curious to see if the little brother, iMac 21.5", is immune from this video problem. Any idea?

GLL92, that is a good question. I believe that the 21.5 iMac is exhibiting the same problem however most people seem to be reporting problems with the 27 inch model.

gerti,

I think you raise a good point. I just received my i7 on Friday and the only instance of flicker I had was when I awoke it from sleep. Since then it has been fine with pretty extensive use. Hopefully this is a hardware issue that Apple is working on for us.

The quoted message tells us how to find the production week from the serial number.

Oops. Sorry, the quoted message does not show up. It was from Dicebier, and can be found as the top one on the page 26.

I had a new 27inch iMac come a few weeks ago and when I got mine out of the box the screen did not come on at all. The computer was on because the OS was asking me to select my language. Called Apple and they said they would send me another one. It`s been about a week and I`m still waiting although they did say there would be a delay because the demand was so high. Hopefully my new one does not have any problems..I`ll let you guys know how the new one works out.

I was experiencing the same problem yesterday, once every few minutes it would tear, a few times during the day it went black for a second. Today, however, the problem has not happened once all day. Here is all I did:

Because I was having issues playing Flash videos as well (as described in other forums), I followed the solution posted in one of the forums, which was to un-install Flash and install it again, then do a Permissions check and restart the computer.

Could the Flash issue be related to the screen-tearing issue? It doesn't make sense to me, but maybe it just helped to clean up the permissions and reboot.

olucho wrote:
I was experiencing the same problem yesterday, once every few minutes it would tear, a few times during the day it went black for a second. Today, however, the problem has not happened once all day.

Olucho, if you read some of the previous posts (those that are actually on topic ) you'll see that the symptoms can disappear completely for several days at a time. I think the point that has to be drummed home is this: if your machine exhibits any of these symptoms at any time, then regardless of how often it doesn't, it never stops being a machine that has exhibited symptoms. Your new iMac is not supposed to flicker, ever, period! If there is any indication that it has a fault, then unfortunately, it usually means it has a fault. Apple wouldn't swap them out if they thought they could fix it with a firmware update. Don't accept anything less than a flawless product.