Apple Computer on Wednesday confirmed reports of video-display problems in the new iMacs that are based on Intel processors.
A Mac enthusiast site has reported that in playing video on Apple’s Front Row media browser, some iMacs showed random horizontal lines, ghosting, video tearing and other problems. “Apple is aware of this issue and is looking into it,” the company said in an email. “If a customer has any technical issues, they should contact AppleCare.” AppleCare is the company’s support unit. The site, ConsumerMachine said the problems could best be described as “faint and intermittent patches of whatever graphics are on the screen appearing in random locations (tearing),” the site said. “Aside from the Front Row menu system, these problems also persist when viewing movies or DVDs through the Front Row interface.”
The problems did not appear when playing video through Apple’s Quicktime Player, but users reported that the display troubles occurred when “alt-tabbing between apps or during certain tasks in iMovie.”
“Numerous user software reinstalls have established that the problem is likely not software related, placing the blame on the ATI Radeon X1600 video card,” the site said. ATI Technologies, maker of the video card, did not respond to a request for comment. Apple introduced an Intel-based iMac and notebook in January during the Macworld conference in San Francisco. The company is moving its computers from PowerPC chips from IBM and Freescale Semiconductor to the Intel platform.
