Whenever I turn on my headlights, the radio display goes off (yet the radio still works) and the lights for the gauges (speedo, odo, etc…) fail to come on. This makes for a very dark, and quiet dangerous situation for night-time driving! Headlights, turn-signals, and breaklights all work just fine, except for the aforementioned lights of the gauges and radio.
Most often this is because someone has turned the dash lighting dimmer all the way down. Try turning it up and see what happens.
Success! Your suggestion literally just saved me $75; thank you so very much Mr. Tardis. I actually feel pretty stupid about this b/c this has happened to me before and my past vehicle ('98 Chevy Cavalier) has me convinced now that everything on every vehicle is broken all the time, and that it’ll be a pain in the ass to fix. I love my Nissan Altima. 
Thanks for the update.