Thunderbolt display goes black

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Level 4

3,284 points

Thunderbolt display goes black

Thunderbolt display spontaneously goes black as if the display was unplugged from the computer. This can happen at any time for no apparent reason. It always comes back on after a few seconds, but windows are all resized down to fit the laptop display. Especially irritating is that the iTunes window is stuck under the menubar and can't be moved until I fiddle with Menubar>Zoom, which exposes the top of the window.

This is a 6 month old MacBook Pro and the display is about 3 years old. This all started when I took the display in to the Apple store in Denver for a repair, which they not only didn’t do but made it worse.

Another problem that started at that time was that the TB’s USB ports went intermittent. They may or may not work at any time, making the display useless as a USB hub.

Any idea what’s going on?

MacBook Pro with Retina display, OS X Mavericks (10.9.5), Thunderbolt 27, iPhone 5S

Posted on Feb 24, 2015 9:41 AM

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Answer 1

Best reply

tbirdvet

Level 6

13,665 points

Feb 24, 2015 2:49 PM in response to Gnarlodious

For the USB ports try unplugging the TBD from the wall. Wait 3 minutes and plug back in then test the USB ports. This seems to work for many. It is also possible you have a bad connector. To test you will need to get a TB cable and connect from your Mac to the TB port on the display. If that works then your built in cable is bad. You also may need to update the display firmware which was recently released but if updating the firmware be sure to follow the directions exactly. Firmware update:Thunderbolt Display Firmware Update v1.2

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Answer 2

Gnarlodious Author

Level 4

3,284 points

Feb 26, 2015 8:10 AM in response to Gnarlodious

This may have been caused by an ionizer I had close to the display for the purpose of preventing dust on the screen. I turned the ionizer off 2 days ago and have not seen a black screen since.

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