Will External Video Work If Internal Video Dead? iMac 20" iSight

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Will External Video Work If Internal Video Dead? iMac 20" iSight

hi,

i was following:

"iMac G5 20 inch (iSight), nothing on Display at all ", its archived so no replies were allowed. so, new thread...

evidently the loss of video was a big problem with these models. my friend's has now had this fate visit her. she has a 20" iSight with the ambient sensor on the bottom, i think this makes it a 2nd gen.

there is nothing on the internal video display on startup. listening to the machine start it sounds normal, chime, drive whirs away for appropriate time, etc.

the local apple cert place told her its a bad logic board, i assume they mean the video component of the logic board. (from my observations they never cracked the case open.)

before she trashes it i was wondering if any of you have enough experience with these machines to know if the machine is would still be capable of running an external monitor?

thanks much,

-getting warmer here in the far north.

imac 20" iSight, Mac OS X (10.5.8)

Posted on Mar 16, 2011 8:38 PM

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Answer 1

TeenTitan

Level 4

2,640 points

Mar 17, 2011 4:46 PM in response to alaskagulk

Hi alaskagulk,

the iMac G5 with iSight has a mini-VGA port on the back of the computer. VGA Display Adapter can be used to connect an external VGA display monitor.

If the issues is with the built-in display, then hooking up an external monitor will probable work.
If the issue is with the logic board, then hooking up an external display will probable not work.
If you live near a Genius Bar; they might be able to check for you.

Some things to consider, is that there are some tasks that only seem to work to the primary display. (built-in display) For instance I don't know how you could easily re-install the OS without the built-in display working. Or for instance the holding the option key to boot to a specific volume.
Do you already own a VGA display? Buying a 30 dollar adapter is allot less then a new computer; but who knows how long it will last.

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Answer 2

alaskagulk Author

Level 1

0 points

Mar 17, 2011 9:38 PM in response to TeenTitan

well, there are plenty of bars in alaska, but none of them either contain genuis in their title or patrons.

if it was my machine i might fiddle along with an external display for a bit. but as it belongs to someone not so very techie i'll advise them to move on.

thanks much for your reply.

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Answer 3

romad

Level 3

887 points

Mar 18, 2011 9:40 AM in response to TeenTitan

TeenTitan wrote:
If you live near a Genius Bar; they might be able to check for you.

Unfortunately, Alaska is one of 8 states in which Apple doesn't have a retail presence yet.

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Answer 4

Oct 20, 2012 8:56 AM in response to TeenTitan

Teen Titan. (or anyone else who can help).... I have the same problem with my imac 2006 Only the right side of my imac screen works (other side has these wierd vertical bands and shows nothing. I plug in my external monitor. Now when I move the mouse left to right I can see the mouse arrow leave the right side of the imac monitor and move to the left side of the external monitro....I can't see the whole imac screen on the external monitor....please help...I'm a beginner at all this. I also do not have a start up disk as this computer was given to me. Previous owner had it hooked up to an external monitor. I do have a macbook pro 2011 to work off of if that helps

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