Watching a movie in HDR with my new Mac Mini

Thank you hcsitas. Going through that list again I noticed that when I was setting the HDR on on my Mini, the monitor's picture mode was switching to Vivid. I changed the setting few times and it is not happening anymore, I but I do not know why. It looks like it fixed the problem with the colors, in fact either Standard and Cinema work ok.

However I would say that I have not been able to get a good picture yet. I am not sure I can describe it but it looks like it is more more grainy. When not in HDR mode it is still of a slightly better quality. The problem is that in HDR there is no way to change the contrast or the sharpness of the monitor, so there must be something else.

BTW, something I did not mentioned before is that the whites in the apps (like right now that I am writing this post) look less white (grayish ?) as well. That may perfectly normal when switching to HDR, I am not sure.

Today I had the time to try few things.

First I "Airplayed" videos from the Mini to the Apple TV 4K which is on the upper floor. The connection worked, however I am not sure about the quality. This is a screenshot that shows that the maximum resolution I could get was 1080p. I did not have a lot of time so I did not try to verify if I could change any of the available settings. Changing to HDR however did not make any difference.

Then I tried connecting the Mini to the LG Monitor with the same HDMI cable that I am using with the Apple TV. It is a 6' Belkin that I purchased with the Apple TV from Apple. It is not 3" as recommended but that's all I had. Using the HDMI instead of Display Port did not make any difference.

At that point I decided to try the LG monitor with the Apple TV. It worked perfectly right away. All whites were whites. No dull colors. I tried the same movie and the HDR seemed to work perfectly. That would indicate that the LG monitor is not the problem.

Just to make sure, I finally connected the Mac mini to the Samsung TV, the one that I use with the Apple TV. Unfortunately again, with he HDR setting it showed the exact same problems.

Again, I did not use a 3’ HDMI cable, however the USB-C to Display Port cable that I normally use is 3’. I could buy a 3’ HDMI cable just to make sure, but I tend to exclude that the cable is the problem. All seems to indicate that the problem is with the Mac Mini. As hcsitas said it may be due to a hardware limitation, but want I to hope that is just a matter of setting or software.

I am wondering if members of the forum  have been able to run the HDR successfully with their Mini’s.

Thank you. Yes, the monitor's display port can be set as either 1.4 or 1.2 (default is 1.4). I am using the 1.4 setting. If I switch it to 1.2 the HDR option disappears from the Mini's system display preferences.

Today I received the new HDMI cable. It is a 'Cable Matters Premium Certified HDMI Cable (Premium HDMI Cable) with 4K HDR Support - 3 Feet'.

Unfortunately it did not solve the problem. However it showed two additional problems.

The first one is that with this cable it looks like the Mini is not able to wake up the monitor. Maybe there is some setting that needs to be changed, but I did not want to play with it.

The second one is that if I use this cable, the Mini switches automatically to HDR, just at start up. This may be perfectly normal since it is connected to an HDR capable monitor, but it was not happening with the Display Port, and it's definitely better in that way, at least until I have figured out how to make it work properly with the HDR.

Yesterday I spent some time reading comments from people that have the same problem, on this board and in other places, and I was surprised to see not only that it is actually very common, but that apparently nobody has found a solution yet as well. My understanding is that the limitation is due to the operative system, not the hardware.

I may try to learn how to calibrate the display, or just decide to use it without HDR.

Thank you for your help.

No, as I said unfortunately it did not solve the problem. The screen and the colors look exactly the same, both with the DP cable and the HDMI cable.

I will be glad to upload a screenshot of the settings. Which one do you want to see?

One more things, is it easy to revert any change I make with the calibration? I want to make sure I can go back to where I am now, because the monitor looks perfect as it is, if I don't try to use the HDR.

That you very much.

One question. Do you have a Mac Many connected to an HDR monitor and is it working properly?

If I read Apple's recommendations correctly the display port should work perfectly fine.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT210980

"DisplayPort displays: Use a cable that has a USB-C connector for your Mac and the appropriate connector for the port on your display, which is usually a DisplayPort, USB-C, or Thunderbolt 3 port."