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Target display mode blinking black

I am having a very annoying issue using target display mode with my iMac connected to my mbp. I have the 2meter thunderbolt cable connecting the two machines. They enter TDM correctly but continually the iMac screen will go black for a second and then reappear. This is very annoying and unacceptable to be honest. I have searched and read many blogs and threads about similar issues, none of which have any answers.


iMac

  • 27-inch, Mid 2011
  • 3.4 GHz Intel Core i7
  • 32 GB 1333 MHz DDR3
  • AMD Radeon HD 6970M 1024 MB


MacBook Pro

  • Retina, 15-Inch, Early 2013
  • 2.4 GHz Intel Core i7
  • 16 GB 1600 MHz DDR3
  • NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M 1024 MB


Sometimes it seems I will see a message in the system.log around the time this happens:


Aug 8 18:28:35 iMac.local WindowServer[109]: MPAccessSurfaceForDisplayDevice: Set up page flip mode on display 0x042801c0 device: 0x10e074a10 isBackBuffered: 1 numComp: 3 numDisp: 3


If anyone has some ideas on what may fix this issue I would love to hear them.

OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.4)

Posted on Aug 9, 2013 12:40 AM

Reply
91 replies

Oct 15, 2013 6:14 PM in response to Kosmoe

I have an open case, I believe Jerry Brace does as well.


It has basically been left at "don't call us, we'll call you" I am pretty unhappy with how this issue has been treated and have written a letter to Tim Cook explaining the issue. I hope that turns up the heat a little for us as well. Apple Care has been quite good actually which I did mention in my letter, its just that if there is nothing from the engineers there is not much they can do.



Best of luck to us all!


<Personal Information Edited by Host>

Oct 21, 2013 12:43 PM in response to jarrod78

I have the same problem, I'm using latest MacBook (Retina, 15-inch, Early 2013) + iMac (27-inch, Mid 2011) connected via Apple Thunderbolt Cable (0.5m, new format) to extend my MacBook screen onto iMac display. This blinking with black screen is just killing me. This makes the feature almost unusable.

Do you have any news on that issue?

Oct 22, 2013 4:13 PM in response to FTV

I spoke with a representative from Apple Executive Relations yesterday who informed me that the engineers had told him they were able to fix the issue. I was told that the fix would be availible in the upcoming Mavericks release.


I just updated my two machines today, I really hope this fixed the issue for me. Though seeing FTV's post did not give me much confidence so far. I will try to test for a few hours today sometime.


I had hoped they snuck this fix in with that last minute bump of the GA from 13A598 to 13A603.


Best of luck to you all, I will report back on my findings and continue this thread if the issue is not yet resolved.

Target display mode blinking black

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