2 inch translucent blue line, 27 mac

Any clues on this one, I have, from start up, an irritating two-inch translucent blue line on the screen of my iMac 27 mid-2010 OS X with an ATI Radeon thing inside it.

I took the front off and had a poke about to see if it was a loose cable or something and blew away all the dust but life's rarely so easy.

It does disappear every now and then, doesn't broadcast via chromecast. Any clues?

It was a gift to me and i'd kinda like to fix it so would really appreciate any educated guesses.

EDIT: rather spookily it totally disappeared whilst typing this - that only happened three times in the last two months. it'll be back tomorrow I'm sure. If not i'll be sure to mention it!

Is the fault there when you first boot up and if and when the iMac has been shut down for a while, like overnight or longer??

Does the iMac run hot? Like very warm if you put you hand on the top left of the display when facing it???






- Patrick
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I had the same problem with my old 21 inch iMac but I had several of those lines down the screen, about three inches apart. Turned out it was the Graphics Card which Apple replaced free of charge.

pm-r said:

Is the fault there when you first boot up and if and when the iMac has been shut down for a while, like overnight or longer??

Does the iMac run hot? Like very warm if you put you hand on the top left of the display when facing it???






- Patrick
======

Click to expand...

Thanks Patrick, yes it's there from boot up. It does occassionally lessen in intensity after a couple of hours but is there 99.5% of the time. The screen area you mentions is not hot at all. The whole thing is normal enough temperature wise.

Gandalph said:

I had the same problem with my old 21 inch iMac but I had several of those lines down the screen, about three inches apart. Turned out it was the Graphics Card which Apple replaced free of charge.

Click to expand...

Im neither the original owner nor is the machine under warranty I don't suppose. The graphics card would seem quite likley.
thanks for your reply.

that'll be a no then...

I guess this wouldn't help, which I think was an attempted "fix" for earlier models:

https://support.apple.com/en-ca/TS3181

And have you tried running the Apple Hardware Test, but usually doesn't help for intermittent problems but worth a try:
https://support.apple.com/en-ca/HT201257







- Patrick
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Thanks, as suggested the first is an old fix which my machine tells me it doesn't need. The test also produced no results but thanks again for trying.
Windows all the way!!

The card is getting very unstable. Enjoy whilst you can, save the pennies as one should consider crefully before spending money on a seven year old computer.

Having said that, the card is replaceable and here is one, a top 1GB card, from eBay. ifixit.com will have tear downs on the procedure which is difficult. Apple Stores will not do it as it considers your computer 'obsolete'. You may bhave a handy PC technicians experienced with Macs who may quote to do the job.


http://www.ebay.com/itm/iMac-27-A13...ATI-Radeon-HD-5750-1GB-661-5578-/262844126911