[haildixon]

ok, i could really use some help with this. about 8 months ago i purchased (used) a graphite 21' apple studio display (the kind that were released right after the blueberry displays) and for the last 8 months i have been using the display between my Powerbook G4 500, an IBM Stinkpad and an HP e-Vectra. up until a week ago everything ran fine. i was not using a monitor switch in between the computers because the quality was always affected too much, so i just unplugged it from one computer to the other whenever i needed to switch over. so um... like i said, for 8 months everything is ok, then one day it wasn't. the monitor quit working on my powerbook. all i got was a black screen, only ever so often (about every 30 seconds) stuff would flash onto the screen for a split second. whatever was flashing did it so fast that i could never figure out what it was. and that was that, it will not run on my powerbook anymore. i hooked 2 other powerbooks up to it (a 400 and a 550) both of those running OSX (i was using 9.2) and neither of those worked on the monitor either. finally i took it down to the shop to get it worked on. they tested it on a G4 tower and it worked fine, then they tested it on a G4 500 powerbook and got the same problem i got. for the last week they have tried to figure out what was wrong with it but to no avail. on friday i spoke to them and they said that here's what apple had to say.. Apple told them that those monitors were designed to work only on the newest powerbook models using the DVI to VGA adapter. i told them i didn't understand that considering the monitor is a few years old and DVI wasn't even being used when that monitor was conceived. oddly enough, when they used one of the newer model powerbooks with the DVI to VGA adapter, the monitor worked. so it breaks down like this... the monitor works fine on all the PCs i've tested it on, all Mac towers, and the newer powerbooks using the DVI to VGA adapter, but it doesn't work on any of the older powerbooks like the one that i've been running it on the last 8 months.

Whew.... any thoughts? and please, i don't need any smart comments like "just get a new powerbook" don't think i haven't heard that from everyone i told.

thanks,
john

[ddiokno]

Hi Hail,
Sorry to hear about your problem... That really stinks! Question, did you update OSX recently? It could be that Apple might have changed the driver level support and the way the ati mobility card handles the video signal...
Just a thought... try installing the ati retail drivers and see if they help resolve the issue... sometimes the Apple drivers limit the resolutions that you have access to, so that quick flash you are seeing might be the video card sending out an unsupported (so it thinks) resolution.
good luck and let us know..
dave
<a href="http://atitech.com/support/products/mac/radeon/osx/radeonmaceditionosxdrivers.html" target="_blank">ATI retail Mac Drivers -- March update</a>
BTW, I am using these and they are compatible with the OEM Card and did speed up my graphics (TiBook 500)

[ddiokno]

I forgot to add that the retail driver installs in both 9 and X (there is a control panel that it installs, which is only for the retail card, but the actual drivers work)
good luck!
dave

[ddiokno]

Sorry, just another thought... try zapping your PRAM... if it is try to set the resolution at a setting that the monitor doesn't support, this might resolve the issue...
When you go to the monitor control panels, does it recognize the second monitor? also, under X, what would it do when you hit the detect other displays option?
good luck!
dave