Second display problem with 10.9.4

Hankong,

I believe that's a different problem, not least because you are using (analog) VGA, whereas the problem that affects us all is (digital) DVI.
My problem occurs with a Apple certified Thunderbolt -> DVI adapter, and I've also tried a third-party Mini-Display port -> DVI cable and have the same issue.
I'm not saying that it can't be the cable, but I find it unlikely, since it has an Apple logo on it!

I'm surprised the altoronto solution is not a fix for most.

It's unlikely to be anything other than a software issue in my eyes.

Have you guys meticulously followed his instructions and dragged each and every "windowserver" filename to the trash in the locations specified. There is a great wee app called "EasyFind" which is good for making sure you haven't missed any. If you have gone at it half-heartedly because there are a million possible solutions on this thread now, give it another go "like a BOSS!!"

brianwilson71: yes, i've verified with with find (Unix find) that i nuked all of the *windowserver*.plist* files in the Preferences directories (and, in a larger scope, that they're the only ones on the system drive, besides a named variant that are in Directory Services related directories

hanko: yes, i've been using an Apple Dual-DVI dongle since day one. no complaints for years until 10.9.3

csound1: if your substantiation is concerning the Engineering response, you can reference the bug reporter #17083693... oh, wait.. no you can't due to that fantastic bug tracking system. Here is a screen shot of their advice: http://imgur.com/PBrSz48

Hi All,

I had the same problem on OS 10.9.5 but switched out my DVI cable to a DVI-to-HDMI cable, then have an HDMI to mini display port adapter and it seemed to fix the problem for me.

Good luck everyone!

Hi all!

Anyone had any luck with Yosemite, now that it is released?

I tried installing the Yosemite developer preview all the way up to DP7, and was experiencing the exact same re-boot loop. I haven't tried the official release yet, but my hopes are not high :/

no luck. I installed last night but nothing.. still not recognized... I might have to call applecare...

No luck either. What the f... is happening? This is supposed to be professional gear for professional users. I was about to buy a new monitor for my editing suite and a new card to run it. I am doing lots of editing and grading. But can I buy it? Will it work. I am tired of already looking at one display that does not show up.

I called Apple support in Norway today as I had high hopes for Yosemite to solve my problems, but it did not. I got a message that I should hold the line after telling about my problems. Waited for 15 minutes and then I hung up. Have not heard more from them either. This is confusing!!

BUY THIS CABLE: http://www.amazon.com/Cable-Matters-SuperSpeed-2048x1152-1920x1200/dp/B00BPEV1XK

I've had this problem with my external monitor since I installed the 10.9.2 update. Tried PRAM resets, time-machined (fruitlessly) back to 10.9.1, swapped out kext files (computer gave me white screen of death), bought different mini-dvi cables, sent Apple bug reports, made threats, cried myself to sleep, etc. NOTHING WORKED-- short of buying a new imac because I'm a bajillionare with plenty of time and money to throw around.

After about 4+ months of not having an external monitor, pretty much everyone knew of my problem because it was always my wet blanket that I'd throw into a conversation when work came up. Had a friend recommend me this cable because it turns an available USB 3.0 port into an HDMI/DVI output. High resolution, video on it lags a little, colors might be a little wonky so basically: 1. Don't play video on it and expect a good time, 2. Don't print preview stuff on it.

I haven't tried the Yosemite update yet and have only heard wishful rumors that external monitors work now. For $50 however, this adapter is a cheap and usable fix to end the frustration of having a huge blank screen burning into the side of your face every time you're working on your computer.

Hope this info helps. Let me know if you have the same success!

It is also quite annoying that even the usb ports works from the screen that does not get detected.

I am currently running dvi from both my screens, dual of course. And as you know, one of them works.

I have the apple adapter from Dual dvi from my 30" to mini display port for use on my macbook pro. Do you think it would help to use an adapter from the mini displayport to displayport, and run one 30" on dvi as I am doing and one to the displaybort on my graphic card? Would that do any difference at all?

Instead of running both on dvi.

Did apple purposely code the updates of Mavericks to make non-apple cables malfunction? That would be grounds for a claim. iOS 7 upgrade bricked my iphone4s when I plugged it into my sound dock. Now I can't use my samsung 24inch monitor with my dvi cable since upgrading to mavericks. this is totally unacceptable.

finally got mine to work with a cheap hdmi cable and dvi/mini adapter. dvi still doesn't work though. if anyone does roll the dice and upgrade to yosemite, and it works, please post. this is so ridiculous. i have a 2008 macbook unibody and i never should have upgraded to mavericks to begin with, but it was running so slowly, i felt i had to.

I had the same problem - this is how I solved it.

I have an iMac 21.5 inch 2.9GHz that was running Mavericks 10.9.1 that I purchased on January 20th 2014. In December the screen started going crazy, it was stretched out and flickering, so much so, that I couldn't even restart it as the dock was down under the edge of the display. So I took it to the Genius bar at Apple and they repaired it by replacing the display (took a couple of days only - very professional and happy with their work).

Everything worked fine again, except my external monitor no longer worked. That is, the iMac recognised the external monitor (I could see its features in the System info > Hardware > displays) but the screen was black. It was an LG monitor attached via a VGA cable with a Thunderbolt adapter. Note: It worked fine before I took the iMac to Apple, but after they had replaced the display I lost my external monitor.

As I still had an Applecare account I called them > waited 15 minutes until I could talk to someone. We did the following steps:

1) SMC restart

2) PRAM restart

3) Restart in Recovery mode (used Disk Utility to check the MJac HD - all was normal)

4) Restart in Safe mode

5) Upgraded to OSX 10.9.5 Mavericks

Nothing worked!

So to fix this issue I bought a third party cable (a Belkin HDMI to Mini DisplayPort (Thunderbolt) adaptor. As soon as I plugged in this new cable the external monitor came to life! Note: there are also VGA to Thunderbolt cables available but since my external monitor had HDMI ports I decided to try this.

Seems to me (at least in my case) that it's a hardware problem, not a software issue.

Note: I didn't want to upgrade to Yosemite as I was concerned about losing my Bootcamp partition, which I have spent months installing software that I didn't want to lose. Apparently, there is a risk the Yosemite can wipe the bootcamp partition so I stopped at 10.9.5 (Mavericks).

Hope this helps ; )

This is utter horse crap. I just updated to 10.10.2 to see if it would bring my second monitor back running off NVIDIA GTX 680 aaaaaaaand NO. Still no joy at all. Both monitors made by APPLE and given that they are large display port monitors, I'm not sure how to even connect and use adapters to get it to behave again. This is seriously BS. What's up Apple????????