Can't connect three external monitors to mid 2013 Mac Pro?

Question

Level 1

8 points

Can't connect three external monitors to mid 2013 Mac Pro?

Hey All,

Running into quite some issues after updating to el capitan.

I have three external monitors (1x hdmi tv, 1x hdmi-minidisplay, 1xdvi - minidisplay) and can only have two connected and visible at one time.

when i have all plugged in, I see only two, but if I then unplug one of these, the third shows up.

So all cables are working, so are the monitors. I did PRAM, SMC, and safe boot, no difference.

What do I do? I am an editor and need three, how do I make this happen?

Please help,

best

Leah

Etre-check:

EtreCheck version: 2.9.10 (261)

Report generated 2016-04-07 12:43:34

Download EtreCheck from https://etrecheck.com

Runtime 1:28

Performance: Excellent

Click the [Support] links for help with non-Apple products.

Click the [Details] links for more information about that line.

Problem: No problem - just checking

Hardware Information: ⓘ

Mac Pro (Late 2013)

[Technical Specifications] - [User Guide] - [Warranty & Service]

Mac Pro - model: MacPro6,1

1 3.5 GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon E5 CPU: 6-core

64 GB RAM Upgradeable - [Instructions]

DIMM1

16 GB DDR3 ECC 1866 MHz ok

DIMM2

16 GB DDR3 ECC 1866 MHz ok

DIMM3

16 GB DDR3 ECC 1866 MHz ok

DIMM4

16 GB DDR3 ECC 1866 MHz ok

Bluetooth: Good - Handoff/Airdrop2 supported

Wireless: en2: 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac

Video Information: ⓘ

AMD FirePro D500 - VRAM: 3072 MB

SMB2330H 1920 x 1080 @ 60 Hz

S22E310 1920 x 1080

System Software: ⓘ

OS X El Capitan 10.11.4 (15E65) - Time since boot: less than an hour

Disk Information: ⓘ

APPLE SSD SM0512F disk0 : (500.28 GB) (Solid State - TRIM: Yes)

EFI (disk0s1) <not mounted> : 210 MB

Recovery HD (disk0s3) <not mounted> [Recovery]: 650 MB

Macintosh HD (disk1) / : 499.10 GB (159.84 GB free)

Core Storage: disk0s2 499.42 GB Online

USB Information: ⓘ

Apple Inc. BRCM20702 Hub

Apple Inc. Bluetooth USB Host Controller

Mitsumi Electric Hub in Apple Extended USB Keyboard

Mitsumi Electric Apple Extended USB Keyboard

Thunderbolt Information: ⓘ

Apple Inc. thunderbolt_bus_2

Apple Inc. thunderbolt_bus_1

Apple Inc. thunderbolt_bus_0

Configuration files: ⓘ

/etc/sysctl.conf - File exists but not expected

Gatekeeper: ⓘ

Anywhere

Kernel Extensions: ⓘ

/Applications/DiskWarrior.app

[not loaded] com.alsoft.Preview (4.4 - 2012-07-23) [Support]

/Applications/Toast 12 Titanium/Toast Titanium.app

[not loaded] com.roxio.TDIXController (2.0 - 2016-02-04) [Support]

/Applications/TuneClone.app

[not loaded] com.tuneclone.driver.TuneClone_Virtual_CDWriter (1.0.0d1 - 2012-01-15) [Support]

/Library/Extensions

[not loaded] com.TrustedData.driver.VendorSpecificType00 (1.7.0 - SDK 10.7 - 2016-04-07) [Support]

[not loaded] com.drobo.SCSI.ThunderBolt (1.1 [72278] - SDK 10.8 - 2016-04-07) [Support]

[not loaded] com.sony.pci.SxS (1.0 - SDK 10.9 - 2016-04-07) [Support]

/System/Library/Extensions

[not loaded] com.Cycling74.driver.Soundflower (1.5.1 - 2016-04-07) [Support]

[loaded] com.logmein.driver.LogMeInSoundDriver (4.1.60f87 - 2016-04-07) [Support]

[loaded] com.nvidia.CUDA (1.1.0 - 2016-04-07) [Support]

Startup Items: ⓘ

ProTec6: Path: /Library/StartupItems/ProTec6

Startup items are obsolete in OS X Yosemite

System Launch Agents: ⓘ

[not loaded] 7 Apple tasks

[loaded] 167 Apple tasks

[running] 64 Apple tasks

System Launch Daemons: ⓘ

[not loaded] 43 Apple tasks

[loaded] 158 Apple tasks

[running] 87 Apple tasks

Launch Agents: ⓘ

[not loaded] com.adobe.AAM.Updater-1.0.plist (2016-04-06) [Support]

[running] com.adobe.AdobeCreativeCloud.plist (2016-02-11) [Support]

[running] com.logmein.logmeingui.plist (2016-03-21) [Support]

[running] com.logmein.logmeinguiagent.plist (2016-03-21) [Support]

[not loaded] com.logmein.logmeinguiagentatlogin.plist (2016-03-21) [Support]

[not loaded] com.nvidia.CUDASoftwareUpdate.plist (2015-04-06) [Support]

Launch Daemons: ⓘ

[running] com.adobe.adobeupdatedaemon.plist (2016-02-16) [Support]

[loaded] com.adobe.agsservice.plist (2015-09-24) [Support]

[loaded] com.adobe.fpsaud.plist (2016-03-18) [Support]

[loaded] com.apple.aelwriter.plist

[running] com.apple.qmaster.qmasterd.plist

[running] com.cleverfiles.cfbackd.plist (2014-12-03) [Support]

[running] com.datarobotics.ddservice64d.plist (2015-01-12) [Support]

[not loaded] com.datarobotics.ddserviced.plist (2015-01-12) [Support]

[running] com.edb.launchd.postgresql-8.4.plist (2015-01-20) [Support]

[running] com.logmein.logmeinserver.plist (2016-03-21) [Support]

[loaded] com.logmein.raupdate.plist (2015-02-03) [Support]

[not loaded] com.nvidia.cuda.launcher.plist (2016-02-02) [Support]

User Launch Agents: ⓘ

[not loaded] com.adobe.AAM.Updater-1.0.plist (2014-11-11) [Support]

[loaded] com.adobe.ARM.[...].plist (2015-03-25) [Support]

[loaded] com.bittorrent.uTorrent.plist (2015-03-16) [Support]

[loaded] com.google.keystone.agent.plist (2016-03-02) [Support]

[loaded] com.redgiantsoftware.updater.plist (2015-02-20) [Support]

User Login Items: ⓘ

iTunesHelper Application (/Applications/iTunes.app/Contents/MacOS/iTunesHelper.app)

Dropbox Application (/Applications/Dropbox.app)

uTorrent UNKNOWN (missing value)

Other Apps: ⓘ

[running] com.adobe.CCLibrary.78432

[running] com.adobe.CCXProcess.78752

[running] com.adobe.acc.AdobeDesktopService.108512.1645FD35-9F90-4D19-956C-5C721FC9E25F

[running] com.adobe.accmac.79072

[running] com.etresoft.EtreCheck.110112

[running] com.getdropbox.dropbox.61152

[running] com.google.Chrome.47392

[loaded] 416 Apple tasks

[running] 178 Apple tasks

Internet Plug-ins: ⓘ

AdobeAAMDetect: 3.0.0.0 - SDK 10.9 (2016-02-16) [Support]

FlashPlayer-10.6: 21.0.0.197 - SDK 10.6 (2016-03-23) [Support]

QuickTime Plugin: 7.7.3 (2016-03-12)

AdobePDFViewerNPAPI: 11.0.0 - SDK 10.6 (2012-09-24) [Support]

AdobePDFViewer: 11.0.0 - SDK 10.6 (2012-09-24) [Support]

Flash Player: 21.0.0.197 - SDK 10.6 (2016-03-23) Outdated! Update

Default Browser: 601 - SDK 10.11 (2016-03-12)

Flip4Mac WMV Plugin: 3.3.1.8 - SDK 10.8 (2014-12-09) [Support]

3rd Party Preference Panes: ⓘ

CUDA Preferences (2016-02-02) [Support]

Flash Player (2016-03-18) [Support]

Flip4Mac WMV (2014-11-25) [Support]

Paragon NTFS for Mac ® OS X (2015-07-30) [Support]

Time Machine: ⓘ

Auto backup: YES

Volumes being backed up:

Macintosh HD: Disk size: 499.10 GB Disk used: 339.26 GB

Destinations:

Darth Mac Backup [Local]

Total size: 499.76 GB

Total number of backups: 1

Oldest backup: 3/28/16, 12:28 PM

Last backup: 3/28/16, 12:28 PM

Size of backup disk: Too small

Backup size 499.76 GB < (Disk used 339.26 GB X 3)

Top Processes by CPU: ⓘ

76% Google Chrome Helper(5)

14% Google Chrome

4% WindowServer

3% fontd

1% kernel_task

Top Processes by Memory: ⓘ

2.81 GB kernel_task

786 MB Google Chrome Helper(5)

197 MB Dropbox

197 MB mds_stores

197 MB ocspd

Virtual Memory Information: ⓘ

53.00 GB Free RAM

11.00 GB Used RAM (3.76 GB Cached)

0 B Swap Used

Diagnostics Information: ⓘ

Apr 7, 2016, 12:33:03 PM Self test - passed

Apr 7, 2016, 12:29:55 PM /Library/Logs/DiagnosticReports/loginwindow_2016-04-07-122955_[redacted].crash

com.apple.loginwindow - /System/Library/CoreServices/loginwindow.app/Contents/MacOS/loginwindow

Apr 7, 2016, 12:29:49 PM /Library/Logs/DiagnosticReports/WindowServer_2016-04-07-122949_[redacted].crash

/System/Library/Frameworks/CoreGraphics.framework/Versions/A/Resources/WindowSe rver

Apr 7, 2016, 12:07:55 PM ~/Library/Logs/DiagnosticReports/Adobe CEF Helper_2016-04-07-120755_[redacted].crash

/Library/Application Support/Adobe/*/Adobe CEF Helper.app/Contents/MacOS/Adobe CEF Helper

Apr 6, 2016, 07:03:06 PM ~/Library/Logs/DiagnosticReports/Adobe Premiere Pro CC 2015_2016-04-06-190306_[redacted].crash

com.adobe.AdobePremierePro - /Applications/Adobe Premiere Pro CC 2015/Adobe Premiere Pro CC 2015.app/Contents/MacOS/Adobe Premiere Pro CC 2015

Apr 4, 2016, 06:54:06 PM ~/Library/Logs/DiagnosticReports/Adobe Premiere Pro CC 2015_2016-04-04-185406_[redacted].crash

Posted on Apr 7, 2016 12:40 PM

Reply

Answer 1

lllaass

Level 10

210,519 points

Apr 7, 2016 12:47 PM in response to LeahBloeme

The Mac only support two legacy (HDMI. DVI) connections. For additional connection yo need an active connection/adopter.

Use one of these or similar

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815158351

instead of one of your mini displayport>HDMI adopter

Connect more than two DVI or HDMI displays

Mac Pro supports a total of two DVI or HDMI displays when connected via the built-in HDMI port or using the Apple Mini DisplayPort to DVI adapter. To connect additional DVI displays, use an active DVI adapter like the Apple Mini DisplayPort to Dual-Link DVI adapter. You can connect up to six active adapter DVI displays. This requires a powered USB hub since Mac Pro offers four USB ports and you need six USB ports to connect the Dual-Link DVI adapters.

Use multiple displays with your Mac Pro (Late 2013) - Apple Support

Reply

Answer 2

LeahBloeme Author

Level 1

8 points

Apr 7, 2016 12:52 PM in response to lllaass

Ugh that is so annoying.

Ok so if you have two HDMI and or two DVI, you can only have thunderbolt displays or other non legacy in addition?

Reply

Answer 3

lllaass

Level 10

210,519 points

Apr 7, 2016 1:01 PM in response to LeahBloeme

As I said, for more than two legacy connections, additional connections must use an active adopter like the active mini displayport>HDMI adopter link in my previous reply.

You can get simple mini displayport>DVI adopter. Those work for resolution of 1920x1200 max. For greater resolutions you need a $99 dual-link adopter.

Reply

Answer 4

LeahBloeme Author

Level 1

8 points

Apr 7, 2016 1:30 PM in response to lllaass

OK so lets thicken this plot lllaass

I dug up an active DVI adapter, and got all three displays working for maybe 2 minutes. then one of them went to sleep?

in system prefs it shows up as the third display, but its not showing anything

How do I solve this problem now?

Thanks

Leah

Reply

Answer 5

lllaass

Level 10

210,519 points

Apr 7, 2016 1:43 PM in response to LeahBloeme

Is each connected to a different Thunderbolt bus?

Reply

Answer 6

LeahBloeme Author

Level 1

8 points

Apr 7, 2016 1:44 PM in response to lllaass

Yup all plugged into different busses

Reply

Answer 7

lllaass

Level 10

210,519 points

Apr 7, 2016 1:51 PM in response to LeahBloeme

Maybe a bad adopter or cable.. I would try rearranging which monitor on which cable and change buses. See what (monitor, cable, adopter, bus) the black screen follows.

Reply

Answer 8

Apr 8, 2016 6:30 AM in response to LeahBloeme

I dug up an active DVI adapter

Are you quite certain about it being ACTIVE?

ACTIVE adapters are sold as ACTIVE and cost in the neighborhood of US$40.

No "regular" adapter will do this job.

Reply

Answer 9

LeahBloeme Author

Level 1

8 points

Apr 8, 2016 9:32 AM in response to Grant Bennet-Alder

I work at a post house so there are always cables and adapters laying around.

And I got it to work once, as in all screens on and connected, before one went to sleep and never woke up. So that makes it an active one.

Any help on my problem, instead of challenging the validity of my post?

What do I do about this sleeping third monitor, that does show up as a display in system prefs,

And the problem isn't helped by smc, pram, or safe boot.

Thanks!

Reply