Display fuzzy, stuck at start screen

Repair took one full day at Apple Store.

Replaced: 661-4664 Card, Video, NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GS (The video card) for $131.82 plus 39.00 labor. Fully covered if still under AppleCare. They also did a full diagnostic on it before and after, but found no other problems.

Identical problem here, same iMac (24", 3.06GHZ early 2008, NVIDIA 8800GS). Of course, it is just weeks out of the Amex extended warranty period.

I used my wife's MacBook Pro and a FireWire cable (put the iMac in Target disk mode by holding down the "T" key and rebooting), to make a quick clone of the hard drive. Also ran repair and rebuild on the disk while I was there.

Bringing it to Apple service center today for the screen issue.

Difficult to search for iMac screen, static, snow, etc. Fuzzy was a lucky hit. Thanks. I will report back the repair and cost.

Followup: Repair took one full day at Apple Store.

Replaced: 661-4664 Card, Video, NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GS (The video card) for $131.82 plus 39.00 labor. Fully covered if still under AppleCare. They also did a full diagnostic on it before and after, but found no other problems.

Did this ever get solved. I'm having the same issue. Wondering if anyone managed to find the solution?

I did figure it out. I erased the hard drive by connecting a Firewire cable, then the DVD was working again. Managed to get OS X to finally load and we are back in the game.

Thanks for sharing what actions you took. I will have to do this in the case it happens again in the future. I hope this won't happen again for a while.

@philsimonson ..

The Nvidia 661-4664 video card itself runs around $400+ one ebay and other sites to purchase...r u saying the Apple store replaced the video card for $131.82 + $39 for labor ? If so which apple store was this and where ? Thanks.

Same issue here

GPU is damagged ! The exactely same screen on an external monitor !

What the h€ll guys ?! Is that macs ! What do we pay for ? If we need to replace the same parts as on pc units in two years of use why should we make any differences ?! F*ck for 1.500 euros I'd better buy a PC and if my GPU is gone I change it in 5 min and not the whole f*cking night !!

Cheers

MAC NEVER EVER AGAIN

And as if to rub salt in our wounds we have ALL had that wonderful Seagate hard drive failure, just when your most important docs are going be used. Latter is not faulted to Mac, but We are paying for extraordinary builds here. But we seem to be getting low bidder hardware. My plan for today is to attempt a GPU reflow. I’ve had some degree of success with this. One imac is still breathing and posting some 2 years after it’s lifegiving reflow I know this is a temporary workaround at best, but I get a lot of smiles. Some of this could be partially our own fault as well, The last imac that I saw suffer Gpu failure was so tightly packed with dust it was sad. but this same failure I’ve seen with sterile machines as well. I will proceed with a Hillbilly reflow and mark the borrowed time down on a sticky note.