Mac mini stops working only during a youtube video

[brainwave89]

I have a Mac Mini 1.5GHz PowerPC G4 w/ 512MB running 10.5.8.
While watching any video on Youtube.com my screen will go dark all of a sudden. Sometimes by pressing the spacebar the screen will come back and other times I need to press the power button. Weird.
It doesn't shut down otherwise.

This happens both in Firefox and Safari. What might be causing this issue?

 

[Bacong]

I have a Mac Mini 1.5GHz PowerPC G4 w/ 512MB running 10.5.8.
While watching any video on Youtube.com my screen will go dark all of a sudden. Sometimes by pressing the spacebar the screen will come back and other times I need to press the power button. Weird.
It doesn't shut down otherwise.

This happens both in Firefox and Safari. What might be causing this issue?

You're not trying to watch HD video, are you? Because your specs wouldn't allow it.

 

[TWLreal]

My 2006 MacBook, those are the original Core Duo models for the uninformed, has a similar behaviour.

The lamp or backlight will turn off during processor intensive moments: high definition videos, Flash videos, Photoshop crunching. It's as if I've turned the brightness all the way down using the keyboard shorcut. The computer is running and the screen itself is still on, it's the lamp or backlight that's off.

It happens randomly, maybe once a month, and it's such an old computer that I don't even care to fix it or find the issue.

It's weird that your Mac mini would do this with an external screen.

 

[brainwave89]

Thank you both for your replies. It does happen only with HD videos.

Thank you very much!!

 

[indg]

it's caused by overheating. it can happen with any extended stressing of the cpu/gpu. basically the GPU, either on the video card or soldered onto the logic board, is saying "i give up" and shutting down. not really a fix, but you can try increasing fan speed as a temporary workaround.