[iREZ]

I got a 17" Mictrotek C783 LCD that I've used for the past year with my quicksilver tower here at work. Everything was always ok till yesterday when I messed around with the resolution of the monitor, and accidently hit 640 x 480 instead of 1024 x 768. When I did this my screen went beserk and started to trip out (almost like tv static). I was concerned at first but remembered that the Mac would revert if I didn't confirm, so I waited and it stayed like that. Didn't revert, no image, nothing!! So I got an unused cube in the office connected that computer monitor (17" CRT) to my quicksilver and it worked fine, then without reseting I unplug the CRT and plug in the LCD, voila it works again......until I restart the computer and it goes screwy....again. The grey apple screen comes up, and the blue Mac OS X startup screen comes up too, but once my desktop loads the static begins. Before I reset the machine I made sure I put it back to its original resolution and refresh rate 1280 x 1024, and I know the monitor works because it works with the cube. Funny thing is when I restart the computer I notice that the Apple on the grey startup screen is abnormally huge compared to before. So now my question is how do I get this thing to work, I repaired permissions, and did the option-command-r-p thing at startup; do I need to reinstall panther again, and if so can I just Archive and Install or do I have to wipe everything out?

[reader50]

Your QS is smart enough to identify the different monitors and keep prefs for them separately. Make sure Property List Editer is present on your system, it comes with the Dev Tools and can be installed separately by Pacifist if you do not want to install the full Dev Tools. It can also be copied across from another system, it is a self-contained app without any special libraries.

Open Home/Library/Preferences/ByHost/com.apple.windowserver.xxx.plist

... where xxx is a long random sequence of digits and letters.

Toggle root then DisplaySets. There will be one or more number arrays, they are display sets you have had. Inside each is the pref settings for the individual monitors of each set.

Unfortunately, they are not identified by monitor name, so look for the one(s) set to 640x480. Reset the Width/Height/RefreshRate.

The RefreshRate is given in some multiple unfortunately. Set your VGA to 1024 x 768 x 60 Hz before opening the plist, then check the plist. Whatever the lowest number you find for RefreshRate should be the 60 Hz equivalent.

--------------------

Possible simpler answer. Move the plist file to the Trash and reboot. Sometimes us geeks can get carried away.

[Boochie]

You mention that things go screwy when your desktop shows up, which makes me think that you have some corrupted preferences files. Try creating a new account on the machine and configure that one to be logged in automatically when the machine boots up. Does the problem disappear? If so, the prefs in your original account are messed up. Unfortunately I'm not sure which particular .plist file contains the monitor/display settings.

[iREZ]

Im no techie so all this talk about plist and so forth is rather confusing. Before I follow your steps, you guys mention that it might be a system preference error. If I reinstall wont the preference's be fixed, or is this plist thing the only way to do it.

[reader50]

Just move this file to the Trash and reboot. Don't empty the Trash before the reboot.

MacHD/Users/(you)/Library/Preferences/ByHost/com.apple.windowserver.xxx.plist

xxx = a random sequence of letters and numbers.

[iREZ]

Trashing com.apple.windowserver.xxxxxxxx.plist and restarting didn't fix anything. My display now is just black instead of tv static, and the monitor reads "OUT OF RANGE". Any clues now?

Just to add, the new account name and reboot didn't work either.

[reader50]

The "Out Of Range" thing typically indicates the refresh rate is above 60 Hz. Hopefully, the resolution is now set correctly, so you could try your VGA swap trick again to reset to 60 Hz in Displays without touching the resolutions (unless the resolution is still wrong too).

A clean install of Panther is the same as trashing the plist file. An update in place (preserving your prefs) would leave the plist file untouched, so the problem would continue.

Hopefully resetting the refresh rate will take this time. If it didn't, I'd get down and dirty inside the plist file, not sure what you should do if you are not comfortable with Property List Editer. How was the LCD installed the first time, were special steps required?

[iREZ]

No steps were needed when I first used this LCD, it was just plug n' play. I don't get how all this can happen by just clicking the wrong resolution. I hate computers sometimes. Thanks for all the effort reader50.

[iREZ]

I just noticed that when I startup with the LCD connected and click the menu button on the monitor, it displays the settings at 640 x 480 59.9 hrtz. Does this give any insight on how to change things. I change the resolution and refresh rate but when I restart it always starts off with these numbers.

I think I could fix things if I could get to the display preference while the lcd is connected, but the only exact way to do so is using the keyboard keys. I could get to the system preference, then when I press "D" it goes to the date and time preference then I could use the arrows up to get to display but I dont know how to click it. Return doesn't work and neither does command-return, option-return, and control-return. Anybody know how to get to the display preferences without using a mouse?

[iREZ]

So here's the way I fixed things. I turned the computer without any monitor plugged in. I then plugged the LCD in and it came on. Then I put it in 640 x 480 60hrtz mode, and I restarted. The computer started acting all screwy again, here's the cool part. Without seeing a darn thing on the screen, I randomly went for the apple menu in the top menu, clicked it, hit the down key 4 times and hit enter to get to my system preferences, without moving the mouse I clicked the apple menu button again and hit the -> key 3 times to get to the view tab, then I clicked down again 11 times to get to my display preference. I then hit tab to get display highlighted, -> to move to colors and make the menu active, <- to move back to display, then I hit the tab button to get to the resolutions, I clicked down until I got to a resolution that worked. I then reset it back to its original 1280 x 1024 75hrtz, crossed my fingers and restarted, and voila eveything was back to normal. Thanks for all your help guys, or I should say reader50. I feel pretty darn good now, can't believe I figured it out, I guess I should read the first half of my sig before doing something like that again.