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My Daughters iBook G4

Submitted by Northy2111 on April 16, 2008 - 3:01pm. Unix and Mac OS X

Hi everyone,
My daughter has landed me with her iBook G4 as it has a problem. The screen suddenly went black or rather grey, complete lose of display!
I thought she had dropped it or spilt something on it , she swears blind she has not! I managed by using an external monitor and the adaptor to get it running. Weird thing is, it only works with the external monitor connected. By this I mean both the iBook screen and the external monitor work, but when I disconnect the external monitor I loose both screens! This to me suggests the default screen is set to be the external monitor, although I am told this cannot be the case! I have reset the PRAM with no effect. Not being very familiar with MAC I am now lost . Anyone know what the problem could be and best of all how to get the iBook screen to work without using a monitor??

Thanks Danny

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cwsmith's picture

Have you tried ...

Submitted by cwsmith on April 16, 2008 - 10:46pm.

• Reset the NVRAM. Power up the computer. Immediately after the startup chime, hold down Apple-Option-O-F until the screen lights up grey (or for about 30 seconds if the screen doesn't come on). Type the following two lines *exactly* as you see them here, and press Return after each line:

reset-nvram
reset-all

The machine should now boot normally. Did this fix the problem? If not, try this:

• Force the machine to rescan its system bus. Open the keyboard. Remove the Airport (or Airport Extreme) card if present. Use a small Phillips screwdriver to remove the RAM shield. If the exposed RAM slot is full, remove the card. If the RAM slot is empty, find a proper card to put in temporarily. Reassemble the computer and start up. The machine should rescan the system bus and *hopefully* reset the video preferences.

» 24 Macs running System 6 thru Leopard
5 PCs running Windows (3.1 thru XP Pro), Ubuntu and Fedora
Apple IIe, Apple IIgs, Color OneScanner, QuickTake 150
Black iPod nano 1G 4GB, purple iPod shuffle 1GB

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iBook g4

Submitted by Northy2111 on April 17, 2008 - 7:01am.

Thanks cwsmith,

I'll try that this evening.

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iBook G4

Submitted by Northy2111 on April 17, 2008 - 3:32pm.

Hi cwsmith,

Your a hero in my house buddy, it worked by reseting the NVRAM, I really thought it was going to be a case of throwing it in the bin.
Thankyou very much for your time.

Danny

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cwsmith's picture

That's awesome!

Submitted by cwsmith on April 17, 2008 - 4:23pm.

Glad it worked for you. Stick around here, kid, and your Macs will go places!

» 24 Macs running System 6 thru Leopard
5 PCs running Windows (3.1 thru XP Pro), Ubuntu and Fedora
Apple IIe, Apple IIgs, Color OneScanner, QuickTake 150
Black iPod nano 1G 4GB, purple iPod shuffle 1GB

login or register to post comments