External Display Trouble

[polakbob]

I recently purchased a mini-Display port to VGA adapter for a presentation I was doing. I used my MBP with the projector without problems. I'm now trying to use the same computer and cable on a little 17" monitor. When I plug in the adapter, the MB's screen goes blue for a second, but nothing else happens. The external monitor stays black the whole time. I see nothing in the Display Preferences that indicates the presence of another monitor.

I've also noticed that in the Color tab of the Display Preferences, where there are normally four options for different color schemes, there is only one; "Color LCD"

I know the monitor and cable work because when I plug the monitor into my wife's iMac the display comes up correctly.

Can anyone help explain why I can't get an output from my MBP to this display? Thanks!

 

[hughvane]

Just to clarify, do you plug the adaptor into your MBP, and is the monitor switched on, before or after powering the MBP on?

 

[polakbob]

I've tried just about every combination I can think of.

I talked to Apple support for an hour a couple of days ago after posting the original message. I got bumped to the senior group after the problem couldn't be resolved. Apparently this is a possible OS X issue that resulted from a recent update. They were unable to fix it and suggested that I continue testing with other monitors / projectors and to look out for an update in the near future.