The new Mac Pro and HDMI outs.

[Davgra]

Hi all,

I just got my new Mac Pro.

Prepared to hook it up to replace one of my older machines. (2008 with double graphic cards)

I use three projectors and a local monitor out, so I figured I just use a few thunderbolt to HDMI converters and it would all be fine,

But no, no....all the Mac recognized was one display hooked up to the thunderbolt ports and one connected via the HDMI port.

I tried all the ports with the same result. Hm...

So I called Apple support and said "this machine is supposed to be able to connect to 6 displays - why am I only getting two to work?

After a long conversation I got to talk with a senior advisor who did not know why. But he sent me a link. And there I found it.

Tha Mac Pro can not be handle more than 2 HDMI-displays! 

So there you have it - VGA is what you have to use if your working with projectors.

http://support.apple.com/kb/ht5918?viewlocale=sv_en

Dave

[Michael Long]

On Thursday, February 6, 2014 11:54:34 AM UTC-5, Davgra wrote:

Tha Mac Pro can not be handle more than 2 HDMI-displays! 

So there you have it - VGA is what you have to use if your working with projectors.

Thanks for sharing this. We almost bought a new Mac Pro for our upcoming show, but we opted for a Mac Mini instead. It's all HDMI TVs, so it looks like we dodged a bullet here.

The link you included confuses me: how many VGA outputs does it support? And can that be used in addition to 2 HDMIs?

--
Michael Long
Projection Designer - Philadelphia

[Paul Gotch]

On Thu, Feb 06, 2014 at 08:54:34AM -0800, Davgra wrote:
> So there you have it - VGA is what you have to use if your working with
> projectors.
>
> http://support.apple.com/kb/ht5918?viewlocale=sv_en

We've already had this discussion on the list and yes you can get 6
digital outputs if you use active converters rather than passive ones.
The simplest being Apple's own dual-link DVI adaptor.

I'm surprised that Apple support don't know this.

-p
--
Paul Gotch
--------------------------------------------------------------------

[Davgra]

What? So you mean I can connect 6 dual link adaptors and get 6 DVI out on the Mac Pro?

And WHY on earth didn't Apple support tell me this? It would have saved me tons of time and work.

Hm.

They're gonna get a call tomorrow....

Thank you!

Dave

[gtwi...@yahoo.com]

I disagree with the idea that if you're working with projectors that you HAVE to use VGA, most recent projectors now incorporate HDMI as well.

Sent from my iPhone

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[Davgra]

Yeah, I know.

I use HDMI on mine.

But I've got four of them.

And the Mac Pro only supports two HDMI out.

That's why I stated "back to VGA".

Davs

[Paul Gotch]

On 6 Feb 2014, at 17:32, gtwi...@yahoo.com wrote:
>
> I disagree with the idea that if you're working with projectors that you HAVE to use VGA, most recent projectors now incorporate HDMI as well.

There are complex issues around driving long runs and EDID emulation with DVI and HDMI however.

Driving HDMI or DVI requires that the port can be switched in to a mode where it's essentially reusing the pins in the Thunderbolt port to transmit DVI instead. Only Thunderbolt bus 1 on the MacPro, hence ports 1 and 2 incorporates the hardware required to do this which is why only those ports work for DVI.

However an adaptor which actively converts the display port signal will work on any port. The reason the VGA adaptor works is that it is active see

http://support.apple.com/kb/ht3382?viewlocale=de_de&locale=de_de

The dual link DVI adaptor is also active where as the single link one is passive. Kramer also make active conversion boxes if I recall correctly. These also incorporate EDID emulation and high quality DVI transmission so may be worth the investment.

It's definitely worth suggesting that Apple update their support article, however I wouldn't be too hard on the frontline guys they essentially will have been given the same information that there is in the support article and are not paid or encouraged to think up nonstandard solutions to problems.

-p
(Who should write this up for the QLab Wiki)

[gtwi...@yahoo.com]

Have you checked into adding additional video cards? Or maybe a Matrox TH2G?

Sent from my iPhone

[Dominic Bilkey]

You have seen the new mac pros right?

[Davgra]

Hi,

it's kind of hard to fit any cards in the 2013 Mac Pro. ;-)

Triple heads are no option either - I'll explain why:

My setup looks like this:

Two Mac Pro early 2008 with twin graphic cards giving me 4 out on each computer.

They are connected via HDMI to an Aten 8x8 HDMI matrix.

The Aten is connected to several projectors - some are spares in case something brakes down - the video is very important in this show.

If a computer malfunctions I can switch the Aten to another preset so Machine B feeds the projectors.

If a projector malfunctions I can route the signal to the spare projector.

The signal is converted to SDI after the Aten and back to HDMI at each projector. This is due to the length of the cables.

The HDMI to SDI converters ONLY accept 720p or 1080p. The triple head does not support this.

So it's kind of complicated...  (for sound I'm using Mbox pro with an 8 channel automatic Radial switch)

The show is already up and running, so I do not want to replace of my cables etc. 

I'm sure this could have been done another way, but this is the way I did, and it has been working perfect since day 1.

Dave 

[Sam Kusnetz]

Michael Long:

> Thanks for sharing this. We almost bought a new
> Mac Pro for our upcoming show, but we opted for
> a Mac Mini instead. It's all HDMI TVs, so it looks like
> we dodged a bullet here.

Michael

With respect, I think there might be a little bit of misconception going on here which I’d like to help clear up. I think that you said that because of Dave’s comment:

> And the Mac Pro only supports two HDMI out.
>
> That's why I stated "back to VGA”.

While I haven’t had any hands-on time with the new Mac Pro, it’s my belief that it supports six displays using either straight mini display port connections or *active* adaptors to DVI, VGA, or HDMI.

Most mini DP adapters to DVI and HDMI are passive, and so in an effort to limit confusion, I believe Apple oversimplifies this conversation by skipping over the nuances, and trusting that anyone who really needs to know this stuff is a professional, and will seek out the information themselves.

A mini DP to VGA adapter is inherently active, utilizing some custom Apple trickery to pull an analogue signal out of a digital connection where no analogue signal “ought” to exist. But this is Apple, and that’s how they roll.

Apple’s mini DP to dual-link DVI adapter is also active. In theory, you could connect six of those and get six dual-link DVI connections off a new Mac Pro (they cost $99 apiece, though, so that’s some serious money there.)

The Mac Mini, while a delightful and very useful computer, doesn’t come anywhere remotely close to the graphics processing power of the Mac Pro. If your video playback needs are modest, you likely can use one to good effect, but I want to make sure folks understand that it’s really not “pro” level, and if anyone is planning any heavyweight projection designs, I strongly encourage using a Mac Pro or a 15” Retina MacBook Pro.

Cheerio
Sam
—
Sam Kusnetz
QLab Field Operative
s...@figure53.com

[Davgra]

Sam - I'm really happy you wrote about the active adaptors.

I spoke to an Apple support person who connected me to a "senior consultant" who didn't have a clue about how to help me. 

I'd rather spend money on a few active adaptors than getting a new VGA matrix and also replacing all of my SDI cables etc.

It's really interesting though, that they don't mention anything about this here: http://support.apple.com/kb/ht5918?viewlocale=sv_en

The following sentence on that page is not true if things are the way you say they are: 

"You can use two DVI displays with your Mac Pro. If you connect a third display via HDMI, it will cause one of the three displays to become inactive. To avoid this, consider using Thunderbolt, Mini DisplayPort, or VGA for connecting additional displays if you are already using two DVI displays."

I would be really happy if some active adaptors would do the trick.

Dave

[Davgra]

On this page Apple writes about active adaptors and how/when to use them on older Mac Pros.

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4279

They don't mention anything like this on the support page for the 2013 Mac Pro.

Strange.

[Greg Leeper]

I have one of these ordered, but it hasn't shipped yet - I've been following the specs, and was reading through that KB article a few days ago - and I think it isn't written well:

It states you can connect 6 displays, 2 per thunderbolt bus using mini display port adaptors to any of DVI/HDMI/VGA - and then they talk about 'bus 0' which has 3 connection ports on it: 2x thunderbolt & 1x HDMI - and this, like any other thunderbolt bus will only drive 2 displays at a time maximum.

The part you quote below is really confusing - and sounds like it should really be referring to Bus 0… on top of that there are no DVI ports on the machine at all… so what are they really talking about?  I'm expecting a call back from the business team at my local apple store tomorrow to clarify this… I'll post what I find out!

[Davgra]

Correct.

No DVI-ports, only one HDMI and 6 TB.

So - this is what I know for facts and have actually tried out on my machine:

1. One HDMI from HDMI-port and one HDMI via Apple standard TB/HDMI converter works.(2 HDMI)

2. Adding another HDMI via standard TB adaptor does not work.

3. Adding a VGA via standard TB adaptor works.(2 HDMI+1 VGA)    (probably works fine with 6 TB/VGA)

Today I'm gonna try to get hold of a dual link TB/DVI adaptor, (haven't seen TB/HDMI dual link) and try adding one or two more HDMI via DVI/HDMI adaptors.

Dave

[Paul Gotch]

On 7 Feb 2014, at 06:54, Davgra <da...@gronaflyttladan.se> wrote:
> Today I'm gonna try to get hold of a dual link TB/DVI adaptor, (haven't seen TB/HDMI dual link) and try adding one or two more HDMI via DVI/HDMI adaptors.

All of the adapter we are talking about are the Mini DisplayPort adapters.

Thunderbolt shares the same physical connector and is designed so that when a DisplayPort device is attached it acts like DisplayPort.

Specifically I am talking about:

http://store.apple.com/uk/product/MB571Z/A/mini-displayport-to-dual-link-dvi-adapter

Again confusing but that's the way Thunderbolt is designed.

-p

[Davgra]

The ONLY place I've found info from Apple is on the sales page in Apple store. (no info on any support page)

There it says:

Note: AMD FirePro GPUs in Mac Pro support a maximum of two passive DVI adapters such as the Apple Mini DisplayPort to DVI Adapter. Active adapters such as the Apple Mini DisplayPort to Dual-Link DVI Adapter can be used to support more than two DVI displays.

I just talked to Apple Care again and the senior advisor didn't know.... :-)

He was also surprised that this is only mentioned at Apple store. 

So - I'm getting an active adaptor today - I'll keep you posted on my results.

Thanks for the tip on active adaptors!

Dave

[Davgra]

OK - so I bought a dual link adaptor.

Now the Mac and Qlab sees three screens + the local monitor.

I've still got some problems, but I think they are related to the Aten switch and me being an idiot... ;-)

So use dual link adaptors as suggested in this thread and things will be fine.

D.

[Sam Kusnetz]

On February 7, 2014 at 1:54:21 AM, Davgra (da...@gronaflyttladan.se) wrote:
> > Today I'm gonna try to get hold of a dual link TB/DVI adaptor,
> (haven't seen TB/HDMI dual link) and try adding one or two more
> HDMI via DVI/HDMI adaptors.

There’s no such thing as a dual-link HDMI adapter; dual-link is a term pertaining only to DVI connections wherein two DVI signals are combined on one cable to carry higher resolution signals than single-link DVI. A dual-link DVI connection uses all the pins on a DVI plug (except the four analogue pins that surround the horizontal “fin”). See attached picture.

HDMI, meanwhile, has several different versions (the most recent is 2.0, the most common that i’ve come across is 1.4) all of which use the same connector, but which all support different resolutions, etc.

It’s not the “dual-link”-ness of Apple’s dual-link DVI adapter that makes the new Mac Pro happy, it’s the fact that it’s an active adapter, so the computer sees it as a thunderbolt device (or a mini displayport device… i’m not sure), and doesn’t care what happens next. With the passive DVI (single-link) adapters, the computer “sees” through the adapter and says “aha! there’s a DVI display connected! You, GPU, do your DVI output stuff please!” and the GPU says, “ok fine, but I can only do two of those."

I also think Apple is telling a bit of a fib when they say that their VGA adapters are active. I think, but I cannot say for certain, that the VGA adapter is actually simply connecting to other pins on the thunderbolt socket, and the GPU is still doing all the work and the adapter is technically still passive. Again, I do not know that for sure *at all.*

So. Any active adapters *should* allow the connection of up to six displays using whatever connector the adapter adapts to, with the caveat that the GPU can only render however many pixels it can render (about 24.8 million, I believe) so the total number of pixels on all your displays combined needs to be at or under that number. For reference, there are just over 2 million pixels in a 1920x1080 display, and just under 8.3 million pixels in a 16:9 4k display.

[Angus Turner]

It'd be interesting to crack open one of the VGA adapters. 

An expensive experiment though!

Thanks
Angus Turner
angus...@gmail.com

[Andy Dolph]

Sam said "...with the caveat that the GPU can only render however many pixels it can render (about 24.8 million, I believe) so the total number of pixels on all your displays combined needs to be at or under that number. For reference, there are just over 2 million pixels in a 1920x1080 display, and just under 8.3 million pixels in a 16:9 4k display."

So does that mean that it's reasonable to expect to be able to run 9 1080p projectors plus a 1080p control monitor from Qlab on a new Mac Pro?  (2 x triple head to go with 3 x1080p each + 4 individual 1080p outputs)

Could any of the Mac Pro GPUs handle this? 

Or is this more of a theoretical maximum - IE It definitely can't do MORE then 24.8 million pixels, but that doesn't mean that it can acceptably handle the 24.8 million pixels in a given application?

I'm guessing it's the later, but I'd like to know for sure...

Thanks,

Andy

[Sam Kusnetz]

On February 9, 2014 at 8:01:26 AM, Andy Dolph (acd...@gmail.com) wrote:
> So does that mean that it's reasonable to expect to be able to
> run 9 1080p projectors plus a 1080p control monitor from Qlab
> on a new Mac Pro? (2 x triple head to go with 3 x1080p each + 4 individual
> 1080p outputs)
>
> Could any of the Mac Pro GPUs handle this?

I got the 24.8 million pixels number by noting that the Mac Pro can drive three 4k displays, and three times 4k is 24.8 million.

I believe the Mac Pro has an additional limitation of six displays maximum, period. So I suppose I should have said, as you suggest “up to six displays, and no more than 24.8 million pixels in total.”

[Angus Turner]

However, a triplehead2go would be seen as 1 display so you'd still be right.

I'd be really curious to see if that'd work :)

Thanks
Angus Turner
angus...@gmail.com

[Andy Dolph]

That's why I was suggesting triple heads... Still 6 "displays" the Mac would see, right?

Sent from my iPhone

[Dave "luckydave" Memory]

One thing to keep mind is that a TripleHead will only support two 1080p displays. But each will be seen by the system as a single 3840x1080 display, so as far as the computer is aware, it's a single screen.

--

luck...@figure53.com

[Sam Kusnetz]

On February 9, 2014 at 5:11:44 PM, Dave luckydave Memory (luck...@figure53.com) wrote:
> One thing to keep mind is that a TripleHead will only support
> two 1080p displays. But each will be seen by the system as a single
> 3840x1080 display, so as far as the computer is aware, it's a single
> screen.

And a 3840x1080 display is about 4.1 million pixels, which means the Mac Pro can theoretically serve six of those.

Theoretically.

Anyone with a Mac Pro, six Thunderbolt TripleHead2Go boxes, and twelve 1080 projectors should definitely try this out and let us know!

[Andy Dolph]

Why will the triple head only do 2 1080p displays?  What resolution does it do 3 displays?

Thanks!

Sent from my iPhone

--

[Drew Schmidt]

On Monday, February 10, 2014 6:46:38 AM UTC-6, Andy Dolph wrote:

Why will the triple head only do 2 1080p displays?  What resolution does it do 3 displays?

Matrox part number	T2G-DP-MIF
Maximum DisplayPort Resolution 1	5760x1080 (3x 1920x1080) 2 3840x1200 (2x 1920x1200)
Maximum DVI Resolution 1	5760x1080 (3x 1920x1080) 2 3840x1200 (2x 1920x1200)
Maximum VGA Resolution 1	4080x768 (3x 1360x768) 3840x1080 (2x 1920x1080)

 ¹ Maximum resolution is system, monitor type and OS dependent – please see the system compatibility information. 

² This mode runs at 50Hz which may be incompatible with some displays. Verify with your display vendor for compatibility.

[Drew Schmidt]

The OS system compatibility report then lists 3 x 1360x768 as the max for all models However, it doesn't list the new mac pro yet. 

I would guess its an OS limitation with Matrox.

[Davgra]

Hi,

now I've done some testing.

Apples dual link DVI adaptor works fine.

But so does something like this:

http://ca.startech.com/AV/Displayport-Converters/Mini-DisplayPort-to-HDMI-Adapter-with-USB-Audio~MDP2HDMIUSBA

So there you go!

Dave

[Andy Dolph]

This is great news! Thanks !

What specs of Mac Pro are you running and how does it handle what you are asking of it ?

Andy

Sent from my iPhone

--

[Paul Gotch]

On Mon, Feb 10, 2014 at 07:40:26AM -0800, Davgra wrote:
> Hi,
>
> now I've done some testing.
> Apples dual link DVI adaptor works fine.
> But so does something like this:
> http://ca.startech.com/AV/Displayport-Converters/Mini-DisplayPort-to-HDMI-Adapter-with-USB-Audio~MDP2HDMIUSBA

Also to get 4K out this

http://www.accellcables.com/B086B-007B.html

might work, for example for driving a Datapath x4.

-p
--
Paul Gotch
--------------------------------------------------------------------

[Davgra]

Hi,

well it's a standard 6-core. I didn't even upgrade memory from the 16GB it comes with. Yet....

I have not done any hard core testing yet - it starts out as a backup machine to my Mac Pro 2008 in the show. (in case there are some problems - we are already up and running the show)

I've got 3 projectors and a local screen.  I will probably add a fourth projector that is currently running from a Mac Book. This is because the show originally needed three projectors and we fitted the Mac Pros with just four video outs.

From what I can tell it works fine, except that it doesn't recognize the MIDI functions of my Mbox Pro2 cards. Only the sound.  I cloned the hard drive of the older Mac Pro, and this does not have any problems with MIDI. I'm going to reinstall the driver since the older Mac was running Firewire 400 and this one has an FW800 adaptor from the TB port.

Dave

[Mike Ritchey]

I don't have a new Mac Pro yet to test these, but Monoprice has some Active adapters (HDMI, DVI, VGA) for much cheaper than the Dual Link from Apple. ($15.20 for one HDMI or DVI)

http://www.monoprice.com/products/subdepartments.asp?c_id=103&cp_id=10326&cs_id=1032601&pn=computer_accessories

If anyone happens to have some and has tested it, let us know!

[Dave]

I still have problems.

I'm not going to use the new Mac Pro live until I understand what is going on.

I'm using three projectors. The Mac sees my HDMI-matrix, but I can only get video to one of the projectors.

I've been using this setup with a Mac Pro 2009 with no problems.

I'm using an Aten HDMI matrix to switch between master and backup Mac, and also to be able to switch to backup projectors in case of failure. 

I'm going HDMI/SDI after the Aten, and the SDI converter ONLY accepts 720p or 1080p. It looks like I'm outputting 720p, but the converters are not indicating video from the new Mac Pro.

Due to the complexity of the setup I can't do all the testing needed, so the new Mac Pro will go back to my studio until the next production.

I do not want to risk anything since we are already running shows and I have no rehearsals to try things out.

The weird thing is that everything worked just fine two days ago - today it did not. And that does not make me comfortable.

Dave

[Andy Dolph]

I wonder if you are having an edid related issue where the Mac isn't seeing a "valid" display.

Sent from my iPhone

--

[Greg Leeper]

I spoke to an Apple Business team rep who confirmed there isn't enough power on the thunderbolt busses so active Mini DisplayPort adaptors are required after 2.

It has nothing to do with what you adapt to- they just need some power.

[Dave]

Hi,

1. It's not an EDID problem. The mac sees the matrix. The two older Mac Pros doesn't have this problem.

2. I'm using active adaptors and the HDMI port. (one Apple Minidisplay/DVI and one "non Apple" Minidisplay/HDMI.)

3. It worked fine tuesday. After a few restars wednesday it doesn't work at all. (exept for the "non Apple" adaptor that gets it's graphics to the projector)

4. It still might NOT be an Apple problem - it could be my Aten HDMI Matrix.

5. I can't really take things apart to test properly since the show has opened and I don't want to risk it.

Thanks for all advices, though!

Dave  (I've accidently used two Google IDs in this thread...sorry)

[Paul Gotch]

On 13 Feb 2014, at 10:37, Dave <da...@popfabriken.com> wrote:
> 4. It still might NOT be an Apple problem - it could be my Aten HDMI Matrix.

This smells like an HDCP problem. On most matrices if one signal path succeeds for HDCP then it gets enabled and any downstream ports which don't succeed just get black.

If this is the issue what is needed is to be able to configure the matrix to say it doesn't support HDCP so it never gets negotiated in the first place. This doesn't seem to be a feature I've found in such products though.

This is the advantage of SDI, converting to it necessarily means that HDCP is disabled.

-p

[Andy Dolph]

I was wondering about HDCP as well...

Does anyone know if there's a way to just turn HDCP off on the mac so it will never try to negotiate HDCP and just won't play protected content?  (for my show machines that would not be any kind of a loss....)

Andy

[Paul Gotch]

On 14 Feb 2014, at 03:34, Andy Dolph <acd...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> I was wondering about HDCP as well...
>
> Does anyone know if there's a way to just turn HDCP off on the mac so it will never try to negotiate HDCP and just won't play protected content? (for my show machines that would not be any kind of a loss....)

Unfortunately not it always tries to negotiate it if the sink supports it. The only way is for the thing the mac is recognising as the display not to support it.

-p

[Tom Brett]

I know that I'm entering way late in this discussion, but for those following the active adapter discussion, there may be another solution to consider on pre-2013 Mac Pro machines, like Dave is using, that we are successfully using at a price point of $29.99 each:

http://www.accellcables.com/B087B-006B.html

We had to go to these early last year when Apple pulled the Active mini DP to DVI-D adapters temporarily off their site, which looking tonight, seems to still be the case.

Also at the bottom of the page of this link they claim to have a less expensive device that competes with the Matrox TH2Go (I have two TH2Go's and have not personally tried this unit, just food for thoguht to look at) :

http://www.accellcables.com/display-port-adapters.html

Just FYI

On Thursday, February 6, 2014 10:54:34 AM UTC-6, Davgra wrote:

Hi all,

I just got my new Mac Pro.

Prepared to hook it up to replace one of my older machines. (2008 with double graphic cards)

I use three projectors and a local monitor out, so I figured I just use a few thunderbolt to HDMI converters and it would all be fine,

But no, no....all the Mac recognized was one display hooked up to the thunderbolt ports and one connected via the HDMI port.

I tried all the ports with the same result. Hm...

So I called Apple support and said "this machine is supposed to be able to connect to 6 displays - why am I only getting two to work?

After a long conversation I got to talk with a senior advisor who did not know why. But he sent me a link. And there I found it.

Tha Mac Pro can not be handle more than 2 HDMI-displays! 

So there you have it - VGA is what you have to use if your working with projectors.

http://support.apple.com/kb/ht5918?viewlocale=sv_en

Dave