Connecting a 3rd monitor to my MacBook Pro

LawDawg2019 wrote:

I bought the M# MAX specifically for the external monitors. I've tried Baseus, Wavelink, and HP docks. Nothing works for me.

According to the Technical Specifications, a 14" MacBook Pro with the M3 Max supports

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Simultaneously supports full native resolution on the built-in display at 1 billion colors and:

• Up to four external displays: Up to three external displays with 6K resolution at 60Hz over Thunderbolt and one external display with up to 4K resolution at 144Hz over HDMI
• Up to three external displays: Up to two external displays with 6K resolution at 60Hz over Thunderbolt and one external display with up to 8K resolution at 60Hz or one external display with 4K resolution at 240Hz over HDMI

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The specifications appear to be the same for the 16" MacBook Pros that have the same chip.

How are you connecting the monitors? My understanding is that

• Macs only support a single monitor over a USB-C (DisplayPort) connection.
• Macs can support two monitors with resolutions of 4K or less over a Thunderbolt 3 or 4 connection. If you plug a Thunderbolt dock directly into a Mac, that Thunderbolt dock can use two of your Mac's video outputs to drive two monitors with resolutions of up to 4K (which can be non-Thunderbolt ones).

So to drive three monitors, you might need three monitor cables running to three ports on the Mac … or two cables running to a Thunderbolt dock, plus one running to a port on the Mac.

I appreciate your response, but I'm not fighting with this. I'll keep my Windows PC. Returning the macbook tomorrow morning.

I bought the M# MAX specifically for the external monitors. I've tried Baseus, Wavelink, and HP docks. Nothing works for me.

I'm boxing it up (as we speak) to send the Macbook back.

Amanda-P wrote:

It's an Apple M3 Pro.

My IT dept told me a powered doc like this one might work. Is that not the case?

I see that the description of that one says that it "requires installation of DisplayLink drivers."

That means that at least some of the outputs are second-class video outputs. Instead of using hardware video output from your computer, they depend on a workaround where third-party software on your machine creates virtual displays and periodically sends updates to them to a.DisplayLink decoder chip set in the dock.

While this lets you attach more monitors than your computer supports, it doesn't, and can't, create first-class, hardware-supported video outputs. Displays attached via such workarounds may suffer from issues like

• Artifacts
• Lags
• Inability to work with DRMed video from streaming video services
• Dependence on the hub vendor (e.g., Plugable) or technology vendor (e.g., Synaptics) to update software, in the event that new versions of macOS break their current software

Judging by the Specifications tab for that dock,

• One of its video outputs uses first-class hardware video output from your computer
• The other two are based on DisplayLink-type output

Thanks SoC. 😉

What CPU does your MacBook Pro have exactly?

The M3 Pro only supports 2 external displays.

The M3 Max supports up to 4 external displays.

If you have the M3 Pro, there is no way to connect a 3rd display to it. Its simply. not possible.

Amanda-P wrote:

It's an Apple M3 Pro.

My IT dept told me a powered doc like this one might work. Is that not the case?

Nope. no hub or dock will magically make the M3 Pro support a third display. Its a limitation of the hardware.

Ineejamac wrote:

Incorrect.

What is incorrect about Phil0124's reply? He said that "Nope. no hub or dock will magically make the M3 Pro support a third display. It's a limitation of the hardware." If you're talking about first-class, hardware-supported, external video outputs, in the context of a MacBook Pro – as he is – that statement is correct. The number of first-class, hardware-supported external displays you can have on any Apple Silicon Mac is very much a function of (a) the SoC and (b) whether the Mac needs to use one of the SoC's video outputs to drive an built-in display.

14" and 16" MacBook Pros with M1 Pro, M2 Pro, and M3 Pro chips support their built-in displays, and up to two external displays. A M2 Pro Mac mini can support up to three displays. This very strongly suggests that all the Pro SoCs have a limit of three first-class displays TOTAL.

The fact that you can use DisplayLink or other workaround technologies to drive displays in a second-class way doesn't mean there's any magic that will give you first-class, hardware-supported outputs for free.

Incorrect.