I was getting ready to go to work earlier today and looked at my computer screen to see that it had a negative image. After screaming at my kids in my head, I calmy asked my older son what had happened. My older daughter said that my youngest son “pushed a button.”
Pushed a button? Pushed a button!!! Something like this doesn’t happen because someone pushes a button! Unless that someone is a 20-month-old boy who likes buttons…
Anyway, I calmly looked through my Display Settings to no avail. My wife offered words of encouragement, like “Did you look in the Display Settings?” To which I calmly said, “Yes, I did.” (After screaming in my head… again…)
Then I did what I should’ve done in the first place: I Googled it. (Side note: I love that Googled is a word that is recognized by autocorrect.)
Apparently, a negative screen image is a “feature” on some Macs. Why? I don’t know. Apparently Apple doesn’t know either, but they did tell me how to fix it. There’s a video below to show you what it looked like.
http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=3576875&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=&fullscreen=1
Negative Screen Image on Mac from Henry Zonio on Vimeo.
Don’t you just love it when you discover new things?
Ha! Be thankful it wasn’t a soda dumped on it like my house! When that happened I went in room for a couple of hours. Those little boys of ours!!! Grr!
Posted by Desiree | March 11, 2009, 10:29 pmOh my! If that had happened, I wouldn't have been screaming in my head… It would've been coming out of my mouth
Had a friend that juice spilled on his.
Posted by Henry Zonio | March 11, 2009, 11:46 pmYeah, I was in my room for a couple hours taking it in. Luckily it was diet soda and has regained some of it's life back. We immediatly took it apart and let it dry. For a while the battery wouldn't charge but starting a couple days ago it did and seems fine. I was having a screen problem but I think that was the son too. when I moved the cursor, the screen would move. Now I'm hoping God will heal the dvd burner
! I haven't had a chance to try it yet though.
Posted by Desiree | March 11, 2009, 11:57 pmhaha, thanks for that simple solution. i also have a 20 mo old boy who cant stay away fm the keyboard. ironically the negative of the negative image in your video is a normal image!
Posted by james | April 27, 2009, 11:17 amThose boys! Anything with buttons or lights they have to push
Posted by Henry Zonio | April 27, 2009, 12:39 pmHi thanks,
It helped.
Posted by deep | May 5, 2009, 7:37 amGreat!
Posted by Henry Zonio | May 14, 2009, 5:50 pmFound your post when I panicked once my 23 month old toddler made the screen go like a negative!! It was a big help, thanks!! Don't you just wonder how they can manage to do things like that!?
Posted by evelyne | June 22, 2009, 12:12 pmHa! I'm glad I'm not the only that has happened to. Glad it was helpful.
Posted by Henry Zonio | June 23, 2009, 2:48 amThanks. I googled it too after my wife looked at every setting and program trying to fix it. When I googled it I found your problem and it fixed my issue.
Posted by James | July 8, 2009, 2:40 amGlad you found it and it helped!
Posted by henryjz | July 10, 2009, 4:39 amWOW!! Thank you so much for your blog! You saved my life!
My daughter left her computer with me for a few days so I could stay connected to the internet while I'm at the shore, and this negative thing happened…I search every setting and had no idea what or why it happened. As soon as I hooked up to the internet, I googled and found your blog. So simple, so easy, so free of charge! I told her nothing of my trouble until after I fixed it…I could have never convinced her that I didn't break her computer. Thank you Thank You Thank You
Posted by CAPerfetti | July 29, 2009, 7:10 pmGlad it was helpful!
Posted by henryjz | July 29, 2009, 7:22 pmTHANK YOU! My 22 month old got to my mac!
Posted by Nanaimo6 | August 2, 2009, 3:28 pmThose toddler are geniuses!
Posted by henryjz | August 5, 2009, 9:46 amafter mine was negative i tried this and it just went to white and black
Posted by Hannah | August 8, 2009, 5:41 amThat's too bad. Sounds like you need to call Apple Support on that one. Hope it all works out for you.
Posted by henryjz | August 8, 2009, 3:51 pmThanks…my 14 month old did the same thing! Thanks for posting the solution!
Posted by Denise | September 9, 2009, 3:34 amThis DID happen to me…..my grandson pushed a button. After hours of trying to figure out what happened I found this post. In two seconds I was able to finally fix it. THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!!!
Posted by Pauline | September 29, 2009, 3:33 am