MacBook Pro (M2 Pro, 2023) - How to setup two external 27" monitors?

diegotrystero wrote:

What is the best method to connect two DELL P2720D monitors in extended desktop mode to the MacBook Pro M2Pro (2023)?

The Dell P2720D is a 27" monitor with a resolution of 2560x1440 pixels and a preset refresh rate of 60 Hz. It has DisplayPort and HDMI inputs. It also has a small USB hub (you can connect one USB 3.0 uplink to get access to a couple of downstream USB 2.0 ports on the monitor).

Dell – Dell 27 Monitor – P2720D User's Guide

If the user wants to drive both monitors through a single port on the M2 Pro MacBook Pro,

• That port needs to be a Thunderbolt port
• The hub, dock or dual display adapter connected to it needs to be a Thunderbolt device, not a plain USB-C one.

The Satechi dock the user is trying to use now seems to work around this by making two plain USB-C connection from the Mac to a single external dock (a rather unusual approach).

Any of the following would work to connect a single monitor directly to the MBP, or to a port on a hub/dock/adapter that uses hardware video output from the MBP.

• HDMI to HDMI
• DisplayPort to DisplayPort (from a dock)
• USB-C to DIsplayPort adapter or adapter cable
• USB-C to HDMI adapter or adapter cable

The MBP's USB-C ports carry DisplayPort and Thunderbolt signals, so a USB-C to DisplayPort adapter or adapter cable would be somewhat more straightforward than a USB-C to HDMI one. (But either should work.)

That link doesn't go to the product description for a particular dock.

When I was browsing on the Satechi site, I found a "Thunderbolt 4 docking station with DisplayLink" that used the DisplayLink workaround to drive one of. its two HDMI ports – something that would be completely unnecessary … and unwanted … for a MacBook Pro with a M2 Pro chip and two external monitors.

Is this the dock you are talking about?

B&H Photo Video – Satechi Dual Docking Stand with NVMe SSD Enclosure

According to the description, the cable coming from this dock has two USB-C connectors, and both of them need to be plugged in for full functionality.

It looks to me as if this is basically two plain USB-C docks within a single chassis. Macs do not support DisplayPort MST daisy-chaining (or its equivalent), and they do not support driving two monitors off a plain USB-C dock. If you want to drive two monitors off a single dock, it needs to be a Thunderbolt one.

Here, it looks to me like the twin USB-C connectors are a way of getting a Mac (that supports multiple displays) to provide signals to two displays over two plain USB-C connections (one display per connection).

"With a single DisplayPort 1.4 and dual HDMI 2.0 ports, you can expand your screen to two external monitors. You can either connect two screens with both HDMI ports, or a single DisplayPort and HDMI port, using the ports farthest from each other. Resolutions up to 4K at 60 Hz is supported by this dock."

So … is the user in question plugging in both USB-C connectors?