iMac Video Display Repair- Imac Repairs iMacs may be beautiful machines, but they’re far from perfect. As much as we lionize Apple (set what I did there?), no machine is without its flaws, and the iMac is no exception, and eventually, you’ll have to invest in some iMac repairs. Among the most common problems are those of the video display, usually due to a problem or failure in the analog system. In these cases, you’ll often discover a bad flyback transformer, or FBT, on the analog board. FBTs are electronic components designed to amplify the voltage to the needed level of the monitor even to work utilizing thin, elegant, tightly-wound wires. Unfortunately, several models of the iMac, namely Revisions A-D, don’t allow the FBT so sufficiently cool, and if it gets too hot, you’re in for some trouble. The wires will melt, causing an internal short. This unfortunate turn of events can completely destroy your machine’s ability to display video, leaving you with tons of input, but insufficient output to use this expensive computer. Further, this malfunction will often render your computer unable to boot up entirely, beginning the process but aborting it midway through if it detects the malfunction. If this is happening to you, iMac repairs are very possible, and should be pursued with all due aggressiveness. Your Options The quickest workaround is to abandon the monitor to the dogs and hook your iMac up to an external display, essentially abandoning what was likely the entire reason you bought it -- it’s so pretty -- and giving you perhaps the most awkward desktop computer you can imagine. But it’s a simple fix, only costs the amount of an adaptor if you already have an old monitor lying around, and gets you back up and running until you can find a more permanent solution to your problem. You may also be able, if you’re sufficiently tech savvy, to go ahead and just tear out this thing’s guts and transport them to another case. You’ll essentially have a giant Hackintosh, but it’ll certainly look better than that frankenmachine discussed above. This may require an additional power supply. Of course, the best solution is just to take it into to the Apple Genius Bar or an
authorized Apple repairs shop, where they can just fix it as good as new. It’ll be pretty expensive -- certainly more so than the above hardware hacks I proposed -because they’ll have to swap out your old analog and video boards for entirely new ones. This is not a cheap job. Lastly, you’re more than welcome to go out and buy replacement parts and just dig in there with nothing more than a screwdriver and a dream. You might even be able to fix it, if you’re a trained, certified mac repairs professional yourself. But if you are, why are you reading this? You already know what to do. As for the rest of you, the above options are probably your best bet.