I've experienced intermitant black screens for a few seconds, then recovers, typically occurs within 2 hours. Occassionally, video does not recover and display goes to "multicolored snow", which recovers by power cycling monitor. I would describes as "HDMI Video dropouts".
Mac Mini 2012, Macmini6,1 (purchased early December 2012)
2.5 GHz Intel Core i5 (with Intel HD4000 graphics, of course)
8 GB memory (2x4GB upgraded myself)
OS 10.8.1 (both out of box, and reinstalled from internet using recovery partition)
problem was observed in these monitor configurations so far:
- HDMI to HDMI and brand new Asus PB238Q (text quality is also POOR in this configuration)
- HDMI to Apple supplied DVI converter to DVI in on Asus PB238Q
- HDMI to Apple supplied DVI converter to DVI on older Samsung SyncMaster2243BWX
I finally received notification about 10.8.2 OS update today, and upgraded to
OS X 10.8.2 (12C3104) Will report back in when I see the issue again (only used for about 1 hour).
So far three calls to Apple Support. I'm frustrated and dissappointed that Apple didn't provide users with any public information on either the pulled 10.8.2 OS update (I tried to install the downloaded update with "no volume meets requirements" error) or this HDMI video drop out issue. All I could get out of the first line tech support today was "We are aware there are issues with your model of Mac Mini, and our engineers are working on it." and "Not all MacMini's have this problem". When directly asked if this was hardware issue, he didn't know (or wasn't saying).
If Apple ever wants to make any headway into the corporate IT world, they will need to quickly become a lot more transparent when dealing with widespread issues. I've already wasted about 6 hours on these issues, much of which would have been avoided if Apple had posted a KB page on these problems and then promised to update when more information was available. Corporate IT departments are not going to waste their time with a company that keeps secrets from customers when buying mission critical hardware and software.
I'm real close to returning this Mac Mini 2012 unit for a exchange --- just roll the dice on another unit. Better then waiting for Apple to say something....I might run out of 90-days phone support at this rate. From the wealthest hardware/software company on the planet, I do expect more.