Mini DisplayPort to HDMI

Has anyone tested Leopard 10.5.7 with this monoprice HDMI to MiniDP adapter? Audio yet?

I just got e-mail from Sendstation announcing that they have released a series of MDP adapters (to DVI, VGA and HDMI):

http://www.sendstation.com/us/products/mdpadapter/

There is also a press release:

https://www.sendstation.com/us/press/release-090527.html

The press release is a bit obtuse in that it says, "Furthermore the HDMI model makes it possible to watch movies or show Keynote or PowerPoint presentations directly from the Mac on a Flatscreen TV or projector." I don't know in what way that makes the "HDMI model" different from the DVI or VGA models. It could be taken as a hint at sound (although they don't explicitly mention sound anywhere, so I'm not optimistic about that) or maybe they're simply implying that most TVs and projectors these days have HDMI but not DVI (or VGA?).

Regards,
Stephen

Remarks for audio

if you follow the first of the above links and look at the fine print at the bottom of the page it says that the hdmi model supports digital audio if it is supplied from the MDP which no mac model yet does.

so it looks as though its a mac issue not an adapter issue for sound.

I'm not so sure if that's an indication that it's not a hardware issue. They may say the 'spec' supports it, but that's a grey area on this one, afaict.

The elephant in the room lingers... why can't Apple simply rls. hop in their 'time machine' and release an sw update months ago? This is ridiculous.

This is a pretty blatant omission. Not sure if this can even be fixed via a firmware / software update. It is possible that audio output is not even physically connected from the sound engine to the nVidia 9400M which drives the mini displayport.

I haven't heard / read an official reason for this decision to not route audio over displayport. This looks like a practice in the crippling of technology, which would otherwise fill a VERY NEEDED (lost for words) requirement for any normal laptop / desktop today. The bottom line is, a much cheaper dell laptop comes with an hdmi port. A lot of people here need some closure on the fact that they spent $2000+ on a machine which has what appears to be a crippled displayport. I hope we get an official response on this soon.

Regards,
Farhan

Wow! This is a really long discussion. Apple Insider & other forums have similar postings. I hope to answer ckellyusa's original question.

1. If you read the DisplayPort (DP), Mini DisplayPort (MDP), and Apple Mac Book Pro (MBP) specifications (especially the main logic board architecture in the Pro Developer Note), audio is optional on the DP interface. VESA is adding MDP to its DP 1.2 specification this summer, so it's not even a public specification yet. It's still proprietary, and that causes some difficulties.

2. Audio is interleaved with video signals during the horizontal blanking intervals of HDTV signals. DP Main Link Lanes carry interleaved audio + video. The nVidia 9400M or 9600M processor is quite remote from the audio section in MBP's, so MBP's cannot interleave the two signals. Audio through the MDP probably requires a custom silicon chip, which Apple apparently hasn't designed yet. Otherwise, you'd get audio over the MDP cable. DisplayPort is still not a stable, mature spec, so it's difficult to cost justify proprietary chip designs. I suspect that next year we'll see integrated audio + video on the MDP cables.

3. Apogee will release an MDP cable in August that will be marketed under the Kanex brand that does what ckellyusa is requesting. Audio comes from a USB port.

See: http://www.prweb.com/releases/2009/07/prweb2622184.htm
http://www.macsimumnews.com/index.php/archive/kanexdebuts_mini_displayport_to_hdmi_adapter_with_usb_digitalaudio/

I'm just wondering if the Mini DisplayPort on the 3.06 iMac is the same as the ones on the MacBooks and doesn't carry Audio...

I use EyeTV and would love to be able to hook the iMac up to the new HD TV to watch my recordings... ...If I have to run an 3.5mm jack from the headphones I guess that will have to do...

I've been using a mini toslink cable from my 15" MBP to standard toslink for some time and it's great. Get one from monoprice.com One end looks kinda sorta like a mini stereo headphone jack and plugs into the same port that an analog jack, onnly instead of being a wire conductor it is an optical fiber that is driven from an led that resides within the same jack as the optical. The other end just plugs into any toslink (the squarish optical input) on any optically endowed receiver, TV etc. My listening room (audio ONLY) uses an airport express, wifi to optical to receiver (actually preamp) and for the TV upstairs I use an optical cable from the power book to the audio input on the TV. The both work great! The video comes out of the minidiplay on the MBP to the TV's HDMI connector. (again a wonderful cable from monoprice.com) AMAZING video on a 55" Sony. I like the idea earlier in this post of using a Minidisplay port to DVI for a single cable solution, but aren't there two kinds of DVI plugs, those that include audio and those that don't?

But what about folks with a TV that doesn't have such toslink connectors. I can attach the HDMI and get video, but if I come out of the Apple headphone jack to say RCA Audio cables and into the TV... the TV, seeing its connected to an HDMI cable, won't look/accept the audio on the RCA sound connectors. I guess that I could try for Svideo input to go with the sound, but I want the digital video! Any suggestions?

Monoprice has a "Mini Displayport Male and USB Male Audio to HDMI Female Converting Adapter" for sale. ETA 9/30/2009

Looks like a better solution for all of us. That said, I'm not sure that it passes anything more than stereo sound.

Here is the link below.


http://www.monoprice.com/products/product.asp?cid=104&cp_id=10428&cs_id=1042802&pid=5969&seq=1&format=2

I don't understand how Apple people think!!! They are miles ahead in some things and centuries behind in others. Doesn't anybody tell them that in 2009 everything comes with HDMI !!!! Are they trying to discourage people of buying their products? No FireWire, no HDMI, No Blue Ray !!!! Why? AH yes I am sorry, they have put FireWire to the new macbook pro, which means that for us the stupid and unlucky ones that we happen to have video cameras with firewire, we must buy the new ones and loose at least 600 Euro just for that connection. Well I think they should pay for it, they should replace my laptop which is only 6 months old. I knew with my little brain then that it would be a problem but I was hopping for a solution!!! So many experts there and no one could see the problem!!! so much for nothing!!! who are you aiming for??? stupid little kids!!! only gadgets? what? 1600Euro macbook without HDMI and firewire!!!! JOKE!!!

"No FireWire, no HDMI, No Blu-Ray"!!! It's really...I don't understand why??
I've bought this Macbook Pro 15", and after I've bought a Mini displayport-hdmi and after I understand that audio isn't supported! I've bought an external Blu-Ray drive, but after I understand that Apple doesn't support Blu-Ray!!! Maybe someone don't understand what I say about Blu-Ray...SO WITH ALSO "SNOW LEOPARD" IT'S NOT POSSIBLE TO VIEW MOVIE ON BLU-RAY BECAUSE THERE ISN'T ANY SOFTWARE (like PowerDvd) AND BECAUSE HDCP ISN'T SUPPORTED...FOR ANYBODY ALSO VLC ISN'T GOOD TO VIEW BLU-RAY!!! I REPEAT IF YOU WANT TO WATCH BLU-RAY MOVIES WITH PC YOU CAN ONLY DO IT WITH WINDOWS!!!! Also the oldest Xp........Unbelievable!!!

I have a MDP to HDMI adaptor that was working brilliantly (no sound though, so had to make do with the macbook speakers. No thanks Apple). But I upgraded to Snowleopard and now I can't connect to the TV anymore, I see the desktop flash up for a second on the TV, then it goes blue again and then black. If I disconnect and try again, it severly screws up the system and I loose the desktop of the Macbook screen too.


I called applecare, but they had no idea and just ran through reseting the SMC and a few other similar things to no avail.

Anyone else experience this?

It really ***** that I can't connect to the TV anymore!

I have the solution. Kanex has created a mini display port to hdmi.
Here's the link-

http://kanexlive.com/products/item.aspx?id=3495

Did you "tmacgolfer1790", or anybody, tested the Kanex solution?

I'm ready to order it to use it with my Mac mini and my Samsung TV

this is a link of my samsung:
http://www.samsung.com/uk/consumer/detail/detail.do?group=television&type=televi sion&subtype=ledtv&model_cd=UE40B7020WWXXU

and here is the link of PDF manual (pages 12-14) for connection ports:
http://org.downloadcenter.samsung.com/downloadfile/ContentsFile.aspx?CDSite=uk&C ttFileID=2213744&CDCttType=UM&ModelType=C&ModelName=UE40B7020WW&VPath=UM/200904/ 20090401132822125/BN68-01985L-00Eng-0330.pdf

please tell me if you see any conflict in samsung specs

thank you

Message was edited by: Therm