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iMac HDMI output

I have a pretty new iMac Pro running latest Mojave. Two weeks ago I bought a 32 in. Vizio TV to use as a secondary monitor when I do a live stream. The software allows fore a Program Out to a second monitor. I plugged in a USB-C to HDMI cable from the Mac to the TV. Everything worked as it should. The second monitor showed up in ARRANGEMENT and a desktop image showed up on the TV. I used this for the live stream program monitor. Put the TV away until two days ago for another live stream. Hooked up the TV and TV said: NO SIGNAL ON HDMI INPUT. Tried three other cables. Same issue. Called Apple. After 30 min. she said "call Vizio". Well.. I had plugged in the HDMI out from a GoPro to the TV and it worked fine. So it's not the TV and I confirmed that with Vizio. This morning I spent another hour on the phone with a senior tech to no avail. He gathered a data dump and is sending it in.

I'm totally stumped. The computer sees the TV in the ARRANGEMENT window and when the tech was screen sharing, he could see a desktop image when he moved the cursor to the other monitor's position. I see nothing on the TV other than "no signal".

Any suggestions from he smart people online would be most appreciated.

I have nothing connected to the Mac other than the TV. No firewalls, weird extensions, etc.

Thanks

iMac Pro, macOS 10.15

Posted on Nov 6, 2020 9:32 AM

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Question marked as Best reply

Posted on Nov 12, 2020 2:39 PM

Oookay, Rick Morton1, maybe I can help you


  1. HDMI is not hot swappable. Both your TV and your Mac have to be turned off for you to plug in/unplug stuff and make the connection.
  2. might be the cable...
  3. Try doing a reset smc/pmu and zapping pram. Starting up in "Safe" mode ((hold the shift key on Reboot) might shed some light on this problem.... adapter should be active as well


good luck

John B

3 replies
Question marked as Best reply

Nov 12, 2020 2:39 PM in response to Rick Morton1

Oookay, Rick Morton1, maybe I can help you


  1. HDMI is not hot swappable. Both your TV and your Mac have to be turned off for you to plug in/unplug stuff and make the connection.
  2. might be the cable...
  3. Try doing a reset smc/pmu and zapping pram. Starting up in "Safe" mode ((hold the shift key on Reboot) might shed some light on this problem.... adapter should be active as well


good luck

John B

Nov 12, 2020 3:45 PM in response to Johnb-one

Thanks, John. But no.... that wasn't it. While on hold while the 3rd Senior advisor was looking something up, I discovered the solution. In the Arrangement window, after connecting a second monitor, there's a button in the lower right, "GATHER WINDOWS". While waiting, I clicked it. That brought up two windows; one for the Retina display and one for the Vizio. In the Vizio window, I changed the selection to SCALE and changed it to 1080. Voila! I got a separate desktop on the Vizio. Over a four day period I was on the phone for a total of 2 1/2 hours with "senior" Apple advisors and got nowhere. Said just what you said... reset smc, zapping, restart, even had me re-install the OS. I had already tried 5 cables. It was a simple button that was right there in the window we had been looking at for 4 days.

Nov 13, 2020 6:50 AM in response to Rick Morton1

Oh. !!! Great... congrats.. glad to hear you got it fixed, Rick morton 1. Hopefully you can remember what worked or write it down for next time. Screen shots can be good, and yes you can do ‘em on an iPhone. I didnt know that until my sister showed me... figured there had to be a way somehow... so here ‘tis: press home button at same time as pressing side Power button... both together at same time... and boom !?! Nevrer knew that before..


john b

iMac HDMI output

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