MacBook Pro purchasers reporting problems with Thunderbolt and Cinema Displays

Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Apple, PC / Laptop

A series of rainclouds has descended over Apple. Purchasers of the company's latest Macbook Pros—featuring Intel's brand-new Thunderbolt ports—are reporting issues when they go to hook up their Apple Cinema Displays to their laptops via a Displayport-to-Thunderbolt connection.

"I have a new MBP with a thunderbolt port, which is connected to an Apple 24" cinema display, using the new thunderbolt port," writes user "Streitz" on Apple's support forums. "I am experiencing one second black outs every few minutes, and fairly regular jitters once the computer starts warming up and crunching some numbers. The shift never occurs on the 15" monitor, only the external. I also still have my old MBP with a mini-display port, and the external monitor works perfect with it."

The display flickering issue allegedly affects all editions of the latest Thunderbolt-laden MacBook Pros. And as the above comment illustrates, it seems to be a problem involving the combined Thunderbolt/DisplayPort connection. The only fix, so far, appears to be the time-honored tradition of waiting it out.

"The flickering and blackouts happen initially a lot when you first plug in the display to the MacBook. Then over time, it slows down and towards the end of the day it either doesn't happen or I do not notice it anymore. But when I notice it, it is annoying," writes Barry Schwartz.

According to Engadget, Apple is allegedly aware of the issue and claims that the problem isn't widespread. That said, Apple hasn't gone on record to identify the source of the display quality problem or, for that matter, what an eventual fix could be.

This article, written by David Murphy, originally appeared on PCMag.com and is republished on Gear Live with the permission of Ziff Davis, Inc.