Macbook starts up with a black screen

[Mdv2]

My beloved late 2008 Macbook unibody is beginning to show signs of aging. It started several weeks ago with the screen turning redish - everything would be visible but colored in red. This has gone, but a new problem has started.

Whenever I power on the Macbook, the screen remains black, but I can hear the beep. Sometimes the screen does turn on but then after the loading bar/white screen, it turns black again. I need to rinse and repeat hard reset a million times to get it started, normally it takes me 20 minutes to finally get it to boot successfully. As soon as its on, it works flawlessly and I've got no problems with the screen, but this means I cannot switch it off.

Does anybody have a clue what this could be?

 

[Quackers]

Do you have an external screen to connect and see what, if anything, is displayed on that.
If nothing displays on that either it could be a graphics card dead/dying.
If the external display actually shows the desktop then it could be a screen/screen connection issue.

 

[Mdv2]

Do you have an external screen to connect and see what, if anything, is displayed on that.
If nothing displays on that either it could be a graphics card dead/dying.
If the external display actually shows the desktop then it could be a screen/screen connection issue.

But if it is the graphics card would be dying, why does it work well once soon as the computer has completely booted?

 

[Quackers]

I don't know, but it's happened before with failing graphics chips, if I'm not mistaken.