HELP! Kids' iMac display issue!

[sigamy]

We have an iMac DV that just started acting up. During boot the monitor is fine--displays colors and good resolution. But once the OS is loaded the screen is sort of black & white. I've check the contrast and brightness, changed resolutions and color depth, nothing has worked. It is almost like a reverse negative image. No colors, just black and white. Is this a hardware issue or software setting? Again, the monitor is fine when OS X is loading.

This iMac has been working fine for years. It was working fine when my kids were playing a game, then the next day the display went crazy. Could my kids have pressed a few buttons or something?

This is a G3 CRT iMac DV running Panther.

 

[robbieduncan]

Could be high contrast mode. Open System Preferences and check in the Accessability pane.

 

[jsw]

Try pressing control-option-⌘-8 (while holding down the first three, press '8'). That'll toggle between the two visibility modes.

 

[TLRedhawke]

You can also access the negative image setting under Universal Access in the System Preferences (Set Picture to White on Black). It's actually a very common thing to hit on desktop keyboards, because the 8 key on a number pad is close to the eject key. The Ctrl-Alt-Cmd-Eject sequence is used to turn the machine off. One little finger slip can cause the display colours to go screwy.

 

[jsw]

because the 8 key on a number pad is close to the eject key.

The key combo only works for me with the '8' above the letter keys, not on the keypad.