Mac mini 6,2 (late 2012) drives 4K display with one minor Apple menu problem

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Mac mini 6,2 (late 2012) drives 4K display with one minor Apple menu problem

In contrast to the information at this Apple support web page (Use 4K displays and Ultra HD TVs with your Mac - Apple Support), which indicates that only a late 2014 Mac mini is capable of driving a 4K display (at 30Hz via the HDMI output), my late 2012 Mac mini 6,2 is able to drive an ASUS PA328Q 4K display at 30Hz via the DisplayPort output. However, one minor problem is that, upon initial restart, the top left Apple menu is displayed faintly. If I merely log out then log back in, the top left Apple menu is displayed normally. This phenomenon occurs with either Yosemite or El Capitan. Has anyone else tried to drive a 4K display with a late 2012 Mac mini and observed this same phenomenon? Can anyone suggest a fix to the faint menu problem, other than to log out and log back in?

Mac mini (Late 2012), OS X El Capitan (10.11.2)

Posted on Dec 23, 2015 11:55 AM

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Answer 1

lllaass

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Dec 23, 2015 12:22 PM in response to kirigiri

Yes, a few others have gotten 4K at 30 Hz on a 2012 Mini

Enable 4K UHD (3840x2160) on Mac Mini 2012 and 2014 in Windows via DisplayPort

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Answer 2

kirigiri Author

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Dec 23, 2015 12:49 PM in response to lllaass

Thanks for this information, but it and related information generally deal with earlier versions of Mac OS X than Yosemite (10.10) or El Capitan (10.11). I did not have to install the mac pixel clock patch (https://code.google.com/p/mac-pixel-clock-patch/wiki/Documentation), which appears to be required for Mac OS X 10.7 or 10.8, in order to drive a 4K display (3840x2160) @30Hz. So, it seems that Apple has provided support for a 4K display in Yosemite and El Capitan, even for a late 2012 Mac mini. My only problem has been that, upon initial start-up or restart, the top left Apple menu is displayed faintly and is therefore difficult to read. If I log out then log back in, the top left Apple menu is normal. So, I speculate that there is a bug in the Mac OS X video driver that fails to drove a 4K display correctly upon initial restart but that somehow the driver does work correctly after logging out then logging back it. Although the extra step of logging in twice is a bit irritating, at least my late 2012 Mac mini does in fact drive a 4K display @30Hz.

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