Chosen Solution
I used to have my Mac Mini (2009 edition) connected to my living room tv. Since we recently upgraded the surround sound, I was wanting to connect it back to my 24" cinema display in the office, but when I connected everything and powered on, I’m not getting any picture. Just a black screen. I’ve done minor troubleshooting using my Mini and my Air. The mini still connects fine via mini display port to my tv, and my air will transfer sound to the cinema display via the usb. Is there a way to determine if the display port connection on the all-in-one cable to the cinema display is bad? Or at this point am I forced into trial and error with swapping out parts? Please let me know if you have any ideas. Trying not to buy a new display in new parts. >.<
We’ve seen a lot of these displays fail more recently. The issue is, there isn’t really a reliable source for the parts of these displays. Apple class all the cinema display models as ‘Vintage’ now (even the thunderbolt 27" model), so the only option is after market sources, which dry up pretty quickly… That being said, if you shine a torch on the display and can see a faint image, and the mac can see the external display as being connected (check under the ‘Graphics/Display’ tap of the system profiler, or system information panel. it should show up showing the display as being connected with its resolution noted, even if the external display is blank) if that is the case, then it is more likely to be one of 3 things. The LCD having failed, the internal logic board or the PSU. The all in one cable does wear and fail on occasion, but in our experience, this causes intermittent connection issues, so it wouldn’t be showing up in the system information panel, and wouldn’t be showing a faint image. Basically, 2 feeds go to the display, so its helpful to know which has failed. You get backlight feed, and you get image. If you can see a faint image, then your backlight feed has failed. Same goes for your display @schwinny. It is likely that your backlight feed is beginning to fail, so it will need tracing, but its a separate issue to the image feed, which is unaffected from what you’ve noted in your symptoms. I hope this helps.
Well I’m not sure if this is the case in apple monitors but in most lcd monitors the first component to go bad is the capacitors in the power supply. This will cause the display to turn on very dim and take several minutes to brighten up or to display black. If you think the monitor is at fault and you have checked your connections thoroughly it might be worth taking it apart to look at the capacitors. If they are bad they will sometimes have a bulge on the top, they should (when working correctly) be perfectly flat. They can go bad without the bulge but this could be a good place to start.
Hi, long time no see. I am reading the same problem here (sorry, it is in Dutch): https://www.macfreak.nl/hardware-macinto… Seems to me many of those 24” Apple Cinema Displays have damaged backlight inverters. Looks like a generic issue. Any chance we get that inverter board as a spare on iFixit.eu?
same with mine, when i power cycle a few times it comes back. i think its the backlight led driver HV9982 as written in another post Low light or no backlight on LCD
Hi Everyone… I have a 24" Cinema display and have been experiencing similar issues as described above. Two years ago I took the screen to a repair facility and they told me it was the logic board that was not working properly. The repair would have cost around $300 dollars… it was just not worth it. I took the screen home with the intention of recycling it but never got to it. The screen stood around 2 years not being connected to power supply. Today I thought I would get rid of it but before I did so I wanted to try turning it on one more time… Connecting it while macOS is running the same problem persists. Screen flickers for half a second (I see my desktop image) and then goes black. Unplugging and re-plugging did not help either. I wanted to try one more thing though and that was seeing if there is any change when my macbook pro is running Windows via bootcamp… And alas! Starting windows, the screen not only flickers for a millisecond but for about 5 seconds and then turns on completely normal… I am writing this connected to the screen and it works fine. I have not rebooted through macOS yet but will try that today. Would be interesting to see if some of you are having the same findings. Nick
This worked for me. Bypass the PWM output according to instructions by user Willi. What components need replacing on the Logic board?
Sometimes, re-plugging in the monitor wall power cord to the wall quickly turns on the picture. Out 1 second back in. Like flicking a wall breaker. May take a few tries. Look for the screen flicker. When you get frustrated unplug the Apple computer wall power cord (not the monitor) and walk away. Even with the refurbished boards it just seemed like the capacitors needed some time to energize and learn. I do have a spare power supply board #661-4821 if someone is ambitious enough to troubleshoot it.
