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Screen Flickering while scrolling after update to Mavericks.

My Macbook Pro 13 inch, Mid 2012 with i5 and 4 GB RAM is having problems after updating to Mavericks. The screen keeps on flickering when I scroll through basically anything. This even happens while changing desktops. Is anybody having this problem?

MacBook Pro, OS X Mavericks (10.9)

Posted on Oct 22, 2013 6:17 PM

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42 replies

Apr 1, 2014 9:31 AM in response to MBPrelay

I found it in a couple of threads on Apple and other Mac forums.


I find 90% of our office's Mac problems in the last 5 years get solved by deleting a .plist of one kind or another so I always search with "problem description + plist" now since it's a painless first attempt and definitely beats reformatting a hard drive.


Micrsoft Office problems seem to get solved by reconciling fonts AND .plist trashes.

Apr 5, 2014 11:59 PM in response to 0215

It seems that there is no immediate solution which Apple has at the momement. After going through couple of email threads on apple disucssion forum I observered that there are about 3 popular solution which can work for you.


1. Reset the system SMC and NVRAM. Please visit the below mentioned links for this.

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3964 & http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1379


2. Go to disk utilities and repair all your disk permission and reboot your system. Perform this task for atleast 2 times.


3. Switch off the 'Automatic Graphic Switching' option by going to: system preferences > power saver.

of all the options which I have tried, this one seems to work best in my system Macbook Retina 15" early 2014. Attaching a screenshot for your reference too.


User uploaded file

May 13, 2014 5:41 AM in response to susanelyon

Purchased macbook pro retina 15 Late 2013 in January. I did reset SMC and NVRAM and it made no difference. I did remove the check box Automatic graphic switching and still no difference. Then i did uninsstall all apps no difference. Then i installed mavericks again spent countless hours on backup and restore still made no difference. Solved the problem for around 4 days then back again. Flickering and slowing down when shifiting screens. unable to read anything giving trouble to eyes because of scrolling. Atlast, i found the solution by deleting com.apple.windowserver.plist file as susanelyon described and it solved the problem.


One thing i am curious about what was in the file. I just deleted without opening it. If someone had checked or someone knows what this file was about or which app is generating this. Please please tell us about this. So we can prevent to face such worse thing again.

Jul 16, 2014 6:36 PM in response to susanelyon

I had upgraded from ML to Mavericks and it worked fine for a couple days. Sudanly the flickering problems started. Mission control, scrolling, dock bar, and other features seamed to be in slow motion and flickering a lot.


I used the Autocad solution but every time I restarted, the problem came.


Now I have delete the file that susanelyon said and it seems to be working.


Thank you all

Screen Flickering while scrolling after update to Mavericks.

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