10.11.4 Window position off-screen after wake from sleep + external display

For the purposes of my primary use case, the laptop is in the closed position and the external 34" display is the primary display when docked. When undocked the laptop assumes the primary display (as it is not connected to the external display).

If I were in a scenario to have the laptop open simultaneously connected to the external display (rare occasion - as when I use the laptop display it is only when not connected to the 34" display), the dock is on the laptop and the external display is an extended desktop. When I close the lid of the laptop, the external display automatically gets the OS X dock.

Hi,

So the Displays pane is not being used to set the primary Display in the first place.

Other than this Wake issue the "Correct" Display is identified and the Dock and Menu Bar appear on the active Display.

Nothing you have said and nothing I can see in the El Capitan version of the System Preferences > Displays suggests that you should decide, or can even do so, which is the default Display.

I have a G4 tower running Leopard and an MacBook Pro version 1,1 that can get up to Snow Leopard which I can connect to VGA displays as I have the DVI to VGA adapters. These versions of the OS seems to need the default Display to be set.

At this point I would have suggested A NVRAM Reset https://support.apple.com/en-gb/HT204063 and also checking the "More Like This" item listed below.

One seems to be close and also suggest a NVRAM reset Re: Wake from sleep resizes external monitor windows to macbook size?

I can't think of anything else at the moment.

7:38 pm Monday; May 9, 2016

Note that I performed a NVRAM reset and the problem was not resolved and continues to persist.

hi,

And the List below ?

More Like This

• External Display Desktop 10.6.2
• Phantom non existent external monitor on Mac book pro
• External Monitor Won't Wake Up from Sleep
• Re: Display and Waking From Sleep for External Display
• Re: Wake from sleep resizes external monitor windows to macbook size?

This problem existed for me with Yosemite but only happened occasionally, but now on El Capitan it happens almost every time I wake the computer from sleep. I've been trying to debug this issue (on and off) for months (years?). None of the proposed solutions on this thread or any other thread made any difference at all. But just last week I discovered a partial solution! Sorry for the longish explanation, I wanted to try and be as clear as possible.

My scenario (similar to OP):

• At work - MBP Retina connected to external LG IPS by thunderbolt, no mirroring and extended desktop, laptop set as primary display
• At home - Connected to external Dell 4K by thunderbolt, laptop in clamshell mode (ie laptop closed)

At work, no issues, ever - windows always left where I had them originally, and no difference whether it was screensaver/sleep/suspend. So let's assume "work mode" is fine. At home, however, if the computer went to screensaver or sleep mode, I'd wake it up to discover any number of random windows off the desktop/offscreen, with only 1/4" visible. Windows would move off both left and right sides too, without any indicator or pattern as to which would be preferred.

But I realised last week that OSX remembers not just screen settings, but it also seems to remember desktop settings for different external screens (and, for me, different model/brand screens - I assume this is a feature, I've not checked/confirmed).

So, on that theory, I decided to see if I could set up the home situation with both screens active initially, to try and induce different behaviour after screensave/sleep. At work, mirroring is off. You can't change mirroring when in clamshell mode, so for this test at home I had both screens initially on. The first important step was to make the external Dell the primary monitor by moving the dock over. Second step was to turn on mirroring. Then close the laptop lid and go into clamshell mode.

End result - for over a week, not a single window has moved off screen coming out of screensaver or sleep. The problem is not completely solved - some windows still move occasionally, but they do so WITHIN THE BOUNDARIES of the external Dell monitor so they are much easier to reposition. Changing these settings for the Dell (at home) has not had any impact at all on the work (non-mirrored) settings for the LG IPS.

Side note, changing the settings in order seems to be important - when I tried setting mirror mode first but didn't change the primary monitor (which you can't do once mirroring is turned on), then the random offscreen window issue would still continue.

Conclusion - something about mirroring isn't handling clamshell mode correctly, and partially ignoring primary monitor settings in some way. It seems to be a sequence/order issue. The partial solution is more than enough for me - dragging 10+ windows using only 1/4" of title bar to grab was seriously annoying every time I woke the machine up. Now I only have to reposition perhaps one or two windows that have moved a little, but no part of any window now moves offscreen at all. It's like the sequence I configured the settings in was important for setting the display boundaries, and now OSX knows how to honour them.

Again, sorry for the long reply, I hope this helps someone.

Hi,

Nice piece of work and about being clear how and why the logic of the steps worked.

That seems very similar to an issue that iChat had about using Blue Tooth head sets (And to some extent other headsets)

By Default the OS picks the Internal Mic (on those that have them) and it is set in System Preferences > Sound > Input tab.

If there are two device they show up.

However in iChat there was an Audio and Video Pane in the Preferences and the Input for the Mic would be a drop down and an extra option to set up a Blue Tooth Headset.

If you changed here without changing the Sound > Input > System Pane then the headset would not work.

To get it to work required needs the Headset to be set up in System Preferences > Sound > Input "first" and then in iChat.

If not done this way the Headset still is not recognised even if both are set to the "correct" settings.

It is order specific like choosing this Screen Layout seems to be.

As a note the Output part of the Headset needed to be set up the same way but seemed to be less critical.

I say again, nice work Jeff.

7:32 pm Friday; June 24, 2016

Seems to have worked for me. Thanks for the post!

I'm experiencing this too! No mirroring, I'm on a Mac Pro with three P2415Q displays attached.

I notice it when OS X puts the displays to sleep. On waking, a selection of background windows (Chrome, iCal, etc) are moved so only 1cm/0.5" is visible and have to be dragged back to the centre.

Started with El Capitan.

Hi,

Did you read this post ?

Re: 10.11.4 Window position off-screen after wake from sleep + external display

8:14 pm Tuesday; August 9, 2016

What post are you referring to?

Humm,

It was linking to this one when I posted

This problem existed for me with Yosemite but only happened occasionally, but now on El Capitan it happens almost every time I wake the computer from sleep. I've been trying to debug this issue (on and off) for months (years?). None of the proposed solutions on this thread or any other thread made any difference at all. But just last week I discovered a partial solution! Sorry for the longish explanation, I wanted to try and be as clear as possible.

My scenario (similar to OP):

• At work - MBP Retina connected to external LG IPS by thunderbolt, no mirroring and extended desktop, laptop set as primary display
• At home - Connected to external Dell 4K by thunderbolt, laptop in clamshell mode (ie laptop closed)

At work, no issues, ever - windows always left where I had them originally, and no difference whether it was screen saver/sleep/suspend. So let's assume "work mode" is fine. At home, however, if the computer went to screen saver or sleep mode, I'd wake it up to discover any number of random windows off the desktop/off screen, with only 1/4" visible. Windows would move off both left and right sides too, without any indicator or pattern as to which would be preferred.

But I realised last week that OS X remembers not just screen settings, but it also seems to remember desktop settings for different external screens (and, for me, different model/brand screens - I assume this is a feature, I've not checked/confirmed).

So, on that theory, I decided to see if I could set up the home situation with both screens active initially, to try and induce different behaviour after screen saver/sleep. At work, mirroring is off. You can't change mirroring when in clamshell mode, so for this test at home I had both screens initially on. The first important step was to make the external Dell the primary monitor by moving the dock over. Second step was to turn on mirroring. Then close the laptop lid and go into clamshell mode.

End result - for over a week, not a single window has moved off screen coming out of screen saver or sleep. The problem is not completely solved - some windows still move occasionally, but they do so WITHIN THE BOUNDARIES of the external Dell monitor so they are much easier to reposition. Changing these settings for the Dell (at home) has not had any impact at all on the work (non-mirrored) settings for the LG IPS.

Side note, changing the settings in order seems to be important - when I tried setting mirror mode first but didn't change the primary monitor (which you can't do once mirroring is turned on), then the random off screen window issue would still continue.

Conclusion - something about mirroring isn't handling clamshell mode correctly, and partially ignoring primary monitor settings in some way. It seems to be a sequence/order issue. The partial solution is more than enough for me - dragging 10+ windows using only 1/4" of title bar to grab was seriously annoying every time I woke the machine up. Now I only have to reposition perhaps one or two windows that have moved a little, but no part of any window now moves off screen at all. It's like the sequence I configured the settings in was important for setting the display boundaries, and now OS X knows how to honour them.

Again, sorry for the long reply, I hope this helps someone.

8:07 pm Wednesday; August 10, 2016

Yep, read that, but can't really see any advice I can follow:

• I have three Dell 4Ks attached to my Mac Pro (nb: NOT MacBookPro), so I don't want any mirroring and have never had it turned on.
• The problem happens when the monitors sleep, the machine never sleeps, and I don't move it anywhere.

But, the problem sounds identical, so interested in ways to stop it happening.

Hi,

My understanding of the post is that it is about which screens are set up in which order.

I went on to say in my answer post that something similar used to happen in iChat particularly with Blue Tooth and other external headsets.

In the case of iChat you had to go to System Preferences > Sound > Input to set the Mic before setting the Mic in the iChat Preferences.

IT seems that for the various screens it makes a difference as to which screen is set to be the master if and when they are actually used as two side by side displays. (i.e. one has the Dock and Menu bar and the other does not).

So in the Arrangement tab the Dock and Menu Bar can be "given" to a specific display.

In this Pic Mirroring is On which puts the Menu Bar on Both.

Turning Off Mirroring moves the Menu Bar indicator to just one display.

The Poster does say it only seems to be a partial fix for them.

8:27 pm Thursday; August 11, 2016