Apple Studio Display black after selecting an unsupported or incorrect resolution on a Mac Studio M1 Max
I just solved an issue where I used EasyRes to change the display to 2560 x 1880, which is an incorrect / unsupported resolution. Since this utility doesn't have fall back error handling, where it asks you to confirm the selected resolution, the screen went black and stayed there.
Hooking up a 2nd display allowed the Studio Display to operate normally, but as soon as that 2nd display was removed the Studio Display went black. Changing the Thunderbolt port the Studio Display was plugged into didn't resolve the issue.
Rebooting into Recover Mode by holding down the power button allowed the Studio Display to function, but starting into Safe Mode would result in the same black screen. Booting into Options from Recovery Mode and reinstalling the operating system (macOS Monterey) didn't resolve the issue.
I eventually found this article and this site: How do I restore the display settings - Apple Community. It's a different setup than what I had, but I figured since nothing else had worked why not delete these two files:
/Library/Preferences/com.apple.windowserver.plist
/Users/[username]/Library/Preferences/ByHost/com.apple.windowserver.*
Thankfully deleting those two files* and shutting down the system, then booting back up, resolved the issue! Why they were't removed during reinstallation and/or why they were being read during Safe Mode booting is beyond me. I've updated the Mac+ Sr. Advisor of my findings, so hopefully this gets back to the engineers.
*If you don't have a second monitor you'll need to boot into Recovery Mode, go into Options, launch Terminal, and use the UNIX commands to navigate the folder structure to those two locations, and delete those two files.
Mac Studio