Tiger screen brigtness bug - is there a fix?

This doesn't help, being old.

And it seems that this is a recurring, but ultimately unresolved, issue.

See???

Reset PRAM, punched PMU, reinstalled system (with combo update).

No dice.

rubeole said:

Reset PRAM, punched PMU, reinstalled system (with combo update).

No dice.

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What happens when you hit F14 or F15? Any response?

rubeole said:

Also, the hotkeys (F14, F15) failed to work.

Click to expand...

Nope. Zero response.

Have you tried all the standard file system repair stuff? repair permissions?

mguertin said:

Have you tried all the standard file system repair stuff? repair permissions?

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Oh yeah, of course. That's part of my regular neurotic routine.

At the moment I'm using an actual program (called... "Brightness Control") to dim the monitor, but I'm sure you can imagine how annoying it is to use a 3rd party freeware app to band-aid such a fundamental known bug.

Well, the display preference must still work. There is a slider in the control panel.

Carl said:

Well, the display preference must still work. There is a slider in the control panel.

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See pic of control panel above. No slider in evidence (part of the bug).

A call to Apple resulted in waiting for an hour on hold, then a 'circuits busy' signal.

Is that an Apple Studio Display feature?

I'm on 10.4.8 and never had a brightness control in the Display preferences. The brightness control along with all the other LCD controls are built into the monitor.

Try Shades - Shades 1.1.5r1 - Mac OS X - VersionTracker

great utility

MacDoc said:

Try Shades - Shades 1.1.5r1 - Mac OS X - VersionTracker

great utility

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Thanks. I've been using one called (get ready...) "Brightness Control" - but I'm sure you can understand how I might be annoyed at having to use a 3rd party app. at all. I'll try Shades for fun though.

@ krs: I have a Studio Display - and the brightness control button that used to queue the monitor display preferences now does nothing at all; c.f. the F14/F15 keys.

Try Onyx for a cleanup - had a similar problem with a sound control

try also reinstalling the Combo updater

MacDoc said:

Try Onyx for a cleanup - had a similar problem with a sound control

try also reinstalling the Combo updater

Click to expand...

Thanks for the ideas!

Onyx: cleaned/'maintained' more than just the pre-checked boxes = no change.

RE-reinstalled combo = no change.

Called Apple: $50 to 'trouble shoot over the phone' = Ahahahaha!


So.

This may sound dumb, but have you disconnected and reconnected the monitor cable? It could be function of signals not getting through to the machine. I'll assume you have tried logging in as another user to check this too.

Only other thing I can think of (assuming the failure occurred without any software being installed / deleted) is that there my be a chip in the monitor that has gone rendering the computer insensate to the ability to change brightness.

Hi, thanks for the reply -

I unplugged/replugged the monitor cable with, alas, no result.
Changed user to the same effect.

Would a faulty chip in the monitor also alter the preferences interface in the way I described...?

My guess (and that's all it is unfortunately) is that if the monitor doesn't conform to certain standards that allow for software to control the screen's brightness then Apple's software won't show the brightness control. For the majority of screens on the market you can just adjust it via the buttons on the screen. It is, of course, a bit of a pain when there are no controls on the screen ^_^;

If you have the option, try out another machine with this monitor and/or another monitor with the machine just to see if the issue persists.