External display on broken iBook

Discussion in 'PowerPC Macs' started by rodti, Sep 6, 2006.

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  1. rodti, Sep 6, 2006

    rodti macrumors member

    rodti

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    #1
    A friend of mine has an iBook with a trashed screen. Long-term he's going to try and get a replacement panel from eBay, but in the mean time thought he'd use it to output to an external monitor. The will occasionally flicker on briefly, and if it does this it outputs to the secondary monitor, but as soon as the panel dies the signal to the external display goes.

    Is there a way (preferably without having to see OS X!) to output to _only_ the secondary display, disabling the internal panel completely? I suspect this is something that has to be done in System Preferences, but that's probably not going to be possible.

    Thanks in advance! :)
     
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  2. Unspeaked, Sep 6, 2006

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    #2
    I think this is only possible on the PowerBooks, not the MacBooks.

    You could always bring the brightness down to 0% and it'll at least turn off the backlight.
     
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  3. rodti, Sep 6, 2006

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    #3
    It's a G4 iBook, if that makes any difference.

    If he were able to get into the display settings for any length of time is it possible to disable the internal panel completely in favour of the external monitor? Perhaps by making the external one the 'primary' display?
     
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  4. Unspeaked, Sep 6, 2006

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    #4
    Woops, I meant iBook, not MacBook!

    I'm not 100% certain, but I'm pretty sure the iBook (even the G4 model) can only mirror video, and thus there's no "primary" display.

    The PowerBook can work when the lid is closed, which turns off the display, but I think the iBook needs to be open at least a crack to allow air circulation, which will always leave the display running.
     
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  5. rodti, Sep 6, 2006

    rodti thread starter macrumors member

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    #5
    Heh, no probs :)

    Mirroring would be fine, but it only seems to allow the secondary display to operate in the brief seconds when the panel can be convinced to flicker on. The problem may well lie deeper in the video hardware...
     
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  6. Unspeaked, Sep 6, 2006

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    #6
    That's what it sounds like to me - the display itself should have nothing to do with whether or not it can output video to another machine.

    I've seen people running iBooks with dead built-in displays off an external monitor, so if this machine is flickering the external output, it's probably something wrong with the graphics (which, unfortunately, are on the machine's main board and not easily replaced).
     
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  7. rodti, Sep 7, 2006

    rodti thread starter macrumors member

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    #7
    I think he's just going to buy a Mac Mini, and looking at the CPU changes now might be a good time! Thanks for your help :)
     
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