Some New MacBook Pros Causing Flickering in 24-Inch Cinema Displays?

[MacRumors]

Electronista over the weekend noted a growing thread in the Apple Discussions forum regarding flickering issues being experienced by users of the new MacBook Pro paired with a 24-inch LED Cinema Display. A couple of users in our own forums have also reported the issue.

Both the 13- and 15-inch models, and likely the 17-inch model, produce intermittent flickering, brief blackouts and other periodic but noticeable flaws when attached to the out-of-sale screen. The built-in notebook display is unaffected.

Users have already tried some of the more common tricks, such as resetting the SMC, but haven't had any initial success. It also applies whether or not the AMD or Intel graphics are being used.

The Apple Discussions thread has continued to grow in the days following the original report, with at least one user reporting experiencing the issue with a 17-inch MacBook Pro.

Apple support staff are reportedly investigating the issue, having swapped out one user's affected machine specifically to examine a unit known to be experiencing problems.

Well, it appears Apple is aware of the issue. An Apple Discussions Host called me a few days ago after seeing one of my recent posts. He offered to swap my MacBook Pro for a new one so Apple Engineers can get their hands on a known bad unit. I shipped it off last night and anxiously await my replacement.

Apple officially discontinued the 24-inch LED Cinema Display last July alongside the introduction of a new 27-inch model, but the company did continue to sell off its remaining stock for some time after the discontinuation.

Article Link: Some New MacBook Pros Causing Flickering in 24-Inch Cinema Displays?

 

[SFStateStudent]

I'm holding off until more reviews....

 

[frnak]

steve's response

Just buy the 27 inch...

- Steve


Sent from my iPhone

 

[Mattsasa]

Well ****'

 

[vincenz]

Probably bad thunderbolt port. That or a firmware update in the near future..

 

[Eidorian]

Mini-DisplayPort is rather fickle.

 

[Dogfood1]

Been there...Done that

Is this something new?

My late 2009 15" MBP has had these same flickering issues with my 24" Cinema Display for 20 months. I got sick of bringing the whole rig to the Genius Bar only to not have the problem replicate itself in the presence of a Genius.

It's intermittent. Sometimes the screen goes black for a moment and other times it does a scramble thing. I've learned to live with it....

However if any Apple people care to help me, feel free to drop me a PM

 

[DrJohnnyN]

Buy the 27". Problem solved.

 

[toddybody]

Hmm...seems the new MBP has some serious QA issue. Flickering Output + Sloppy Thermal Paste != 2200.00 notebook. No worries though, give Apple a few months and theyll iron out the kinks

 

[gkarris]

Great for watching old flicks on it...

 

[SFStateStudent]

It's really weird that flickering might be related to software issues on the iPhone, but with a MBP and a cinema display it's related to hardware issues; or is it...

 

[SFStateStudent]

Great for watching old flicks on it...

Too funny gkarris; too funny...

 

[toddybody]

Buy the 27". Problem solved.

Oh Boy! I'd love to have the 27"...I just wished 1440p panels would drop already! Yeesh, even the Dell U27 wont dip below $850.00

 

[stockscalper]

The low end model's card doesn't have enough memory to handle the refresh required on a big external model. Apple really pulled a hose job on the low end laptops this time.

 

[nohma]

The low end model's card doesn't have enough memory to handle the refresh required on a big external model. Apple really pulled a hose job on the low end laptops this time.

Seriously, that has nothing to do with it. On a 13 inch MBP plus 27 inch ACD there are no problems. And a 15 inch MBP plus 24 ACD inch does give this problem.

 

[juicedropsdeuce]

.
Every Apple product release is plagued by poor QA or design. Things weren't always this way....

 

[chris snell]

For what it's worth, I had this problem with the new 27" Cinemas and my Mac Pro. Applecare replaced the display and all is well now.

 

[tbrinkma]

The low end model's card doesn't have enough memory to handle the refresh required on a big external model. Apple really pulled a hose job on the low end laptops this time.

Dude. It doesn't take more than a few MB of RAM to handle a display that size. I'm putting this down to a slight timing difference that will be cleared up with a firmware update, either for the display or for the laptops.

 

[DrJohnnyN]

Oh Boy! I'd love to have the 27"...I just wished 1440p panels would drop already! Yeesh, even the Dell U27 wont dip below $850.00

I get anything Dell for free but refuse to touch the stuff!

 

[daneoni]

And a 15 inch MBP plus 24 ACD inch does give this problem.

It does.

 

[wonderspark]

It just works.

 

[cube]

Another reason why it should have had a DisplayPort 1.2 connector and a different 10Gbps PCIe connector.

 

[Digitalclips]

Is this something new?

My late 2009 15" MBP has had these same flickering issues with my 24" Cinema Display for 20 months. I got sick of bringing the whole rig to the Genius Bar only to not have the problem replicate itself in the presence of a Genius.

It's intermittent. Sometimes the screen goes black for a moment and other times it does a scramble thing. I've learned to live with it....

However if any Apple people care to help me, feel free to drop me a PM

I have a 15" i7 late 2009 MBP which works flawlessly with the 24" LCD I am happy to report. Have you tried creating a small partition on the drive and installing Snow Leopard on that and nothing else. Try booting into that and using that for a while and see if it is still happening. I had some other issues I swore were hardware until I tried this and discovered it was indeed software related. Good luck.

 

[mattwolfmatt]

You're looking at it wrong.

Steve

Sent from my iphone 5

 

[KT Walrus]

The low end model's card doesn't have enough memory to handle the refresh required on a big external model. Apple really pulled a hose job on the low end laptops this time.

I have my 13" Macbook Pro (i7 model) hooked up to my HP ZR30w display (2560x1600) through the mini-displayport. Most of the time, it has worked great. The only issues have been with waking up from sleep. One morning, the display went all goofy (with only pieces of the external display being redrawn in all sorts of places where it shouldn't be). The computer was locked up and I had to hard reboot it.

The only other issues I've had is with flickering when it wakes from sleep. It will flicker 4 or 5 times quickly before the display stays on.

I haven't used the 13" built-in display yet as I've always kept the lid closed when hooked up to my big HP monitor (which I love better than Apple's glossy displays that have too much glare for me).

Anyway, I think the graphics has enough built-in memory to handle a big display. I even watched a TV show full screen for an hour and it replayed perfectly. But, my unit has shown a few anomalies that seem to be related to waking from sleep.