MBP13‘3 and External Monitor Problem (screen goes pink/ laptop hangs)

Well I called Apple. They had no suggestions other than to take it to the store. I took it in,in it's frozen purple state. They also had few suggestions. He thought maybe it was a logic board problem, but since I've owned it for less than two weeks they gave me a brand new one. So far so good, but I haven't tested it heavily yet. If you don't hear back from me, all is well!

Interesting aside: when I tested it this morning, the screen went into powersave and turned off. When I awoke it, the external monitor had colored static for about 5 seconds, and then returned to functionality. I believe I've seen people complain of this, but since it functions properly after, it doesn't really bother me. It's the lesser of two evils at this point.

Hi there, ppl!

I bought a MacBook Pro 13" (2010) here in Argentina with the same problem as you. I've tried everything, including installing the OS from scratch without any luck. A friend of mine has the same model as mine without this annoying problem (he had bought it a few months before I bought mine), so I guess it's a hardware problem.

I'm going to bring the mac to the store next monday, so then I'll tell you any news I have.

Well, I took mine in and just got it back today—they could not reproduce the problem. They stress tested it for an hour while I was there, then kept it three days for further testing. They did some hardware tests as well as "real world" tests—just playing videos and various other things that would push the video card.

So now I'm stuck wasting my own time trying to reproduce it. Hopefully I can get it to happen fairly quickly, but since it was fine for a month at one point, who knows. If it does freeze I guess I'll just leave it that way and take it in as soon as possible.

On the bright side they did give the impression that if I continue to have problems they'll probably do something even if they still can't reproduce it, especially since it's so new.

—

Out of curiosity, has anyone reproduced the issue—specifically the pink/purple display on a new 13.3" MacBook Pro—without ANY third party software installed? It certainly seems like it's a hardware issue, but it's also possible there are certain apps that are more likely to trigger the problem.

I really can't remember what I had running when the problem happened—seemed like I was often just working in BBEdit, with apps like Safari and Tweetie open. Possibly Xcode, maybe Photoshop.

okay just to recap, out of everyone who has gotten a replacement part (ie a new logic board) or a replacement machine, are any of you still seeing this issue or did that resolve the problem?

i personally bought my new machine because i am a freelance designer (hence the desire to use my brand new samsung display as a second monitor for my machine while working) and due to my workload i have not had anytime to mess around with the geniuses or applecare at this time. i was hoping to wait until someone had had success with one of the options tried on this thread before i take mine in. because it has been more than 30 days i guess i have until the end of my warranty to get this resolved... although i have to mention that just having bought a brand new mpb and not even being able to use a second monitor in 2010 blows...

out of the $2000 i have spent on apple products in the last 2 months my first 13"mbp was DOA and went back immediately, my second brand new one looked used (had coffee stains near the power port and also on the charger) although it came brand new from apple and was wrapped like it was new... and my iphone 4 was basically unusable (reception problems that went above and beyond what other users were complaining about) and i had to return it. if i had more time i would definitely create a blog out of my experience with apple this year after being a 20 year mac devoted user... but i might just have to settle for trying to get some press for this issue and my story on technology blogs or mac blogs if we don't see a response from someone in this forum from apple soon.

the whole reason most of us have mbp's and second monitors is because we need to work on the machines (or one monitor would suffice to surf and play music on) and not knowing when my computer is going to randomly shut down and lose all my open files is not an option for me.

anyway sorry for the tangent but anyone subscribed to this thread, if you can give us an update on what worked, didn't work that would be awesome.

Ok, well... for me having a new MBP didn't change anything.
So I've given up, and I'm working only with my 13,3" built-in monitor... it ***** because I'm used to work with a dual-screen configuration but I have no choice.
The only thing I hope now is that Apple will release a patch to fix it in the next few weeks or months, as I'm pretty sure this is not hardware... (but who knows, huh?)

After reading this thread, and dealing with the issue for 2 months, I finally took my MBP to the apple store this past week. They told me it could be a hardware issue, they ran diagnostics, nothing wrong. They offered to ship it off for 7 days to get a new logic board, but also recommended I do a reformat to eliminate a software issue. Not wanting to be w/o my machine, I took it; did the reformat, locked up again a day later: http://bit.ly/bnEQwf

Took it back to the apple store, let them take it away. Amazing I had it back in my hands two days later, with a new logic board and keyboard. *knock on wood* Hasn't done it for the last 3 days now!

Today I've received the MacBook Pro with a new logic board. They couldn't reproduce the problem, but they've changed it anyway. There has been no problem yet.

Mathew: take the MacBook again to the store. Maybe there are some logic boards with problems and others without it. It's a matter of luck.

well, i had the same problem on my mbp 2010 13" and a eizo cg210 display.
my system collapsed every 30 minutes. when i used only my mcp with no external display everything was jut fine.

i called apple and they didn`t know anything about the problem. we made some restarts and other stuff but the problem remained.

today i just installed the imac 2010 mid update, not the whole package but the nvidia files...
since them, i had not A single freeze. i hope the bug is gone.

any other news on that issue?

Are there any special instructions/actions/caveats attached to the installation of the iMac Nvidia files?

How did you do it?

It sounds as a reasonable solution to something that looks like a software problem, even with the hardware replacements that sometimes seem to help.

I'm still having this issue... can you confirm that the imac mid 2010 software update fixes this issue? Like most the people on here, the issue does not occur during extensive use. Usually the screen goes blank when I'm just running itunes and safari.
hope this gets fixed. Has anyone had continued issues after bringing it into apple?

i`m testing heavily these days...
i put my external screen 8h a day on my macbook and we will see if it works.

my first impression is that it has improved already. without any update my macbook crashed once a hour. i can tell you at the end of the day if it returned.

Message was edited by: blackmade

I got a new macbook pro last week (13' 2.4 running osx 10.6.4) and am having the same problems listed here.

first day i got the macbook it worked fine. second day i connected it to an external monitor and it started crashing intermittently. the screens would go grey and to get the computer back i have to turn it off and on using the power button.
the macbook pro was running flawlessly over the weekend without being connected to an external monitor and today i tried to connect it again and it crashed!

i doubt it's a problem with the monitor as it worked fine with my last 15' mac (bought circa 2006).
i edit video a lot and bought the 13' as the 15' equivalent is £500 more expensive and with an external monitor connected the 13' would be fine... but without it's a real pain.

really would appreciate a solution to this issue.

Hey all,

I'm having the same issue. I got a new MacBook Pro 13" about 3 weeks ago, was working wonderfully until I hooked it up to an external monitor yesterday and received the white/pink/purple screen of death. Had to hold the power button down and reboot.

I can live without the external monitor on my desktop, but I teach at a university and need to be able to hook up the laptop to an overhead projector to teach. Has anyone experienced this issues when connecting to a projector? I just tested it for about half an hour, and no problems, then had to leave because someone else needed the room. I will try having it set up for an hour or more when I find a free classroom, and post an update here. But if anyone else has insight into the projector issue, I'd appreciate hearing from you. I don't want to go into teach the first day of class and be surprised by a frozen computer. 🙂

Thanks!

the imac firmware nvidia drivers doesn`t fix the problem.

any other news on macbook pro 13 and external screen???

I spoke with a senior adviser at Apple Care yesterday. He said they are aware of the problem and are working on it. Said they already had numerous machines sent to them and were currently testing. He did not know how long it would take to get a fix, though he said if it's an Apple issue it could be done quickly, but if it involves something with the Intel chip or NVIDIA graphics card, it could take much longer. He said it could be days or months. He didn't even recommend exchanging the computer yet as there's no guarantee it would fix the problem. He recommended periodically checking for software updates. He said he would monitor the issue and if/when there was a solution he would e-mail me. So if I hear from him, I'll post it here.

Although I haven't done a longer test hooked up to a projector yet, according to the thread below projector produce the same problem as external monitors.
http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=11544004&#11544004

Message was edited by: Heron2010