Kitten dancing on my keyboard blackened my external monitor

[Sparqee]

The kitten actually managed to screw up the mouse and keyboard by activating Universal Access (which I corrected) but I'm baffled by the black external monitor. The problem monitor is attached to the mini display port with a VGA adaptor.

If I plug a new monitor into the mini display port it works fine. If I plug the problem monitor into another computer (using VGA) it works fine. If I plug it into the main DVI port of the Mac Mini it works fine. But when I plug the problem monitor back into the mini display port the screen is just black. System preferences show the monitor is attached and doesn't give any indication that there is a problem. I've tried changing the screen resolution, refresh rate, color profile, mirroring, etc. but the screen remains black. Any ideas on what keyboard shortcut might have caused this? Or more importantly what key commands might correct it. Something about the video signal of the mini display port has been changed. Something that some monitors don't mind but *this* monitor can't handle. If all else fails I'll go get a mini display to DVI adapter but I'm pretty sure all I really need is an elusive key command.

The Mac Mini in question is running 10.5.8. The problem monitor is an old no name 17" LCD, and here is the offending keyboard tap dancer:

 

[jojack]

Could be; Mini's display resolution or the hertz is set to high for that particular display.

 

[Sparqee]

Could be; Mini's display resolution or the hertz is set to high for that particular display.

Alas, I've already tried all of the possible screen resolutions, color depths and refresh rates to no affect.

 

[Sparqee]

Problem Resolved

I say "resolved" rather than "solved" because the problem simply went away. Having plugged and unplugged this monitor multiple times over the last week and even having left the monitor powered off and unplugged for two days all to no avail, just now I plugged it back in and Bingo! It works fine. The only explanation I can think of is that somehow when I tested the DVI port on the monitor earlier today it reset something in the monitor.

Now... I just need to figure out a way to keep the kitten away from the keyboard.

 

[Ice Dragon]

Put the lid down? Problem solved.

Beautiful cat by the way.

 

[danpass]

 

[Ruahrc]

A wild guess but maybe it was that the monitor was looking for input on the wrong port, hence no signal (i.e. looking for signal on the VGA port whereas it should have been looking on the DVI port).