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

That's very disappointing. I was really hoping your process would be an identifiable fix.

because this truly is an awesome machine

I agree. I have sympathy for those experiencing problems. This is day 8 of enjoying my best Mac ever and I have lost count of how many. There are three here in working order but the i7 is way beyond any Mac I have had. Naturally I was nervous prior to its arrival. I admit that there is a faint yellow tinge but no great concern if it gets no more obvious. It was only the yellow reports around here that had me peering closely.

Paul_31 wrote:

Well, I took my iMac to an Apple Service Centre to have the cable reseated as was suggested by AppleCare as a result of the 'capture' they did and sad to say it's made no difference. Ho hum.

That would have been too easy I suppose. Back to the endless speculation then

I haven't read every post concerning the iMac problem but has anyone attempted to connect another monitor and run it in extended desktop mode and then video mirroring mode?

{quote:title=dgbater wrote:}I haven't read every post concerning the iMac problem but has anyone attempted to connect another monitor and run it in extended desktop mode and then video mirroring mode?{quote}

I don't know about the modes, but I believe some folks have connected external monitors and seen the flickering on the external as well as the internal.

It's fixed, and it couldn't have been any easier! I was seeing the same as everyone else in this discussion with intermittent flickers and screen going completely back for a second at a time.

I've no reason to believe that my solution won't also solve the problem for lots of others. As it turns out, where the power plugs into the back of the iMac, it is not a tight fit and can easily become loosened with the tilting of the display. Mine wasn't very loose, I could only push it in about 1/16 of an inch more, but with a fair amount of pressure, that's all it took to stop my screen flickering.

If you loop the cord through the hole in the back of the display stand, I think this makes it even more likely it will pull loose slightly if you often adjust the tilt of your screen.

Let me know if this helps anyone

Interesting observation Russell, but color me a skeptic. Mine was tight and in all the way, I checked, and I can't imagine that folks would be literally losing power due to a loose connection but that it would always only affect the screen - dropping power from your Mac, even for a fraction of a second, would not just blank the screen, it would power off the CPU and/or otherwise power down or crash the machine.

Well, I suppose it wasn't causing a complete loss of power, maybe just a reduced amount. I don't really know. All I can say is since tightening the plug, I've been 3 days with no problems, and I work all day on my system as a graphic artist.

Mpat and Simon,

Thanks for the informative posts. That is the kind of detailed information that we all need. I do recall reading somewhere online that Apple purposely put as much space between the CPU and the GPU as possible, in order to minimize the heat build-up in one place inside the unit.

Today marks day 21 since I finalized my order. Going my what I have read here, being as I ordered through an AAR, I suspect that I may not see my new iMac until some time in January, or maybe even February, if Apple doesn't resolve all of these issues soon.

My perspective at this point in time is that while I'd like to get the new machine sooner, if waiting longer means ironing out all of the problems, so that I don't get caught in the replacement merry-go-round, then I will gladly exercise patience, and just wait for it to get here...not that I really have any choice.

Hello everyone,

I am a brand new Mac user. I am Italian.
Know that my Italian's heart Flickering with you. I called customer service and I have done to change the model, according to calculations drawn up here on my iMac was built in full in 47 weeks. You are not alone. my new unit should arrive December 22. fingers crossed, really. According to my calculations, since it will be sent on 14 December, is already part of a second wave of iMac. Remember, we bought all the early models, and as with any new technology is often the first wave is defective (Playstation, Blue rey players, X Box ... to throw all those releases on day 1).

so ... Wish me luck for a good IChristmas ...
will continue to send pain that goes back models until they give me a good one. are stubborn and fierce. here in Italy we say "+like a kitten clinging to the hilt+"

If the second failure is ask an _Ipod as a gift_!! he!

stay tuned.

PS: if my English ***** blame the translator of google, not me u_u

Message was edited by: Jerico Kane

The power cord was definitely not the problem Russell Power is either on or off, a loose connection wouldn't give you less power. Glad to hear your iMac is working though. What's crazy is that I didn't do anything with my iMac and it hasn't flickered in days, maybe almost a week now. Seems that a couple others have had this experience too, it just goes away?? I ordered another machine anyway but who knows, I might just end up keeping this one...

I have it too.

27" iMac, Core 2 Duo 3.06 4GB RAM, standard off-the-shelf model. 10.6.2. Did a Time Capsule migration from a Mac Pro tower which worked perfectly. Not many apps on my iMac, though I have VMWare Fusion 3.0 running WinXP.

I've had two bouts of flickering where the screen will flash off for an instant or sometimes a white band will flash on the screen.

First time I called tech support. Very helpful. Booted with install disk, did a repair disk which showed no trouble, and a hardware test which again showed no trouble. We reset the PRAM and did a system power reset (unplug everything including power from the iMac for 10 seconds or more).

After all of that it seemed fine.

Second time, which was today, I tried logging off which didn't help. A restart seems to have helped, so far.

I'm in the habit of leaving my computer on 24/7 since I often need to remote into it from home for work. I have a screensaver set for 15 minutes and screen off at 30 minutes.

Twitter seems full of other people with the same trouble. One I know took it into the store and they replaced it outright without even looking at it.

{quote:title=Ellipsystematic wrote:}The power cord was definitely not the problem Russell Power is either on or off, a loose connection wouldn't give you less power. Glad to hear your iMac is working though. What's crazy is that I didn't do anything with my iMac and it hasn't flickered in days, maybe almost a week now. Seems that a couple others have had this experience too, it just goes away?? I ordered another machine anyway but who knows, I might just end up keeping this one...{quote}
Mine went for days between flickering events. I don't think this is indicative that it has gone away, although who knows.

Yeah, mine hasn't flickered in two days but it's going back regardless. The mere knowledge of knowing it has this problem, however rare, is enough for me. I really hope Apple identifies the problem and sorts this out soon.

Mine 3-days old i7 started doing it today No blackouts, just white horizontal stripes once a while. After the restart nothing so far in last 30 mins. Hope it's fw prob otherwise Apple will have to change thousands of iMacs! I have Apple Care as well so I'm presuming won't be a problem to change anytime later if persist.