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LotusoftheLeaf

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Nov 30, 2008
20
0
My younger brothers just gave me their Acer X213W monitor which I am now using as a secondary monitor on my MacBook. The picture randomly keep flickering off to a black screen. The power light still indicates it's on and sound is still playing, but no picture. Sometime moving the mouse or pressing a button seems to restore the picture immediately, other times it doesn't.

I Googled the problem and others having a similar dilemma were told there was something wrong with the monitor. This monitor has been lightly used for less than a year and my brothers said this never happened to them when they used it.

The monitor is connected by VGA using a Monoprice Mini DisplayPort adapter. Could the connection possibly be the problem? I have a DVI cable, but no adapter for it. I'm willing to buy one if this will fix the problem. This secondary monitor will also be used as a TV through my EyeTV and it would be really annoying to have the picture going out when watching a movie or trying to play a video game.
 

LotusoftheLeaf

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Nov 30, 2008
20
0
Not really. The only other computer in the house currently is my mom's laptop and she doesn't let anyone near it.

After shutting the monitor off for the night and turning it back on, it seems to be losing the picture less often, though it's still happening. I think I'm going to go ahead and buy the adapter for the DVI and see if that helps. Even if it doesn't, I'd rather have the better quality DVI over VGA.
 

LotusoftheLeaf

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Nov 30, 2008
20
0
I tried changing around the resolution and so far this seems to have gotten rid of the problem. The monitor's maximum resolution is 1680x1050, though the highest I seem to be able to use without problems is 1440x900.
 

LotusoftheLeaf

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Nov 30, 2008
20
0
Seems like if I use the secondary monitor as the primary display it doesn't flicker when set at the highest resolution. Half an hour and no problem so far. But I wanted to use the laptop's display as the main so I could have my EyeTV program running on the larger, secondary screen and still be able to chat or browse the web on the MacBook's display. (I like to multitask. :p)

I have another VGA monitor I could try, but it's pretty old and the colors were going out last time I used it, so I'm not sure if it'd be the best test subject.

My DVI adapter should arrive today or tomorrow. I'm really hoping it can things fixed to the way I want them.
 
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