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frilli

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jul 2, 2019
22
3
Hello to all,
I have a problem connecting the Mac Pro with a 27 "Thunderbolt Display, model A1407.

I saw around the internet that in order to use this monitor with the Mac Pro, you had to use a DisplayPort to Mini Displayport adapter, and for convenience a Displayport extension cable (I put myself in the picture), however nothing, no signal...

if instead I attack the Macbook Pro directly to the monitor cable all OK !!!

Question, but the Displayport port of the Shaphire RX 580 video card that I use ..... must be enabled ?? I also tried from Windows 10, nothing, no video signal arrives .... how can I solve? thank you.

P.S: Sorry for my bad english !!!

N.B. : Using the HDMI port on an HDMI 2K monitor I have no problems
 

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mattspace

macrumors 68040
Jun 5, 2013
3,344
2,975
Australia
Hello to all,
I have a problem connecting the Mac Pro with a 27 "Thunderbolt Display, model A1407.

The Thunderbolt Display is a Thunderbolt device, that has a display built into it. It's not a display that can be plugged directly into a graphics card. Your Mac Pro doesn't have Thunderbolt, so it can't talk to the display.

There are hacky workarounds, but they require cold booting into Windows to "warm up" a Thunderbolt to Displayport mixer card.
 

rawweb

macrumors 65816
Aug 7, 2015
1,126
943
Apple made two nearly identical displays, the 27” LED Cinema Display (Mini DisplayPort) And the 27” LED Thunderbolt Display (thunderbolt 1.0). The only difference was thunderbolt allowed them a few more ports on the back all via one cable. The 27” Cinema Display was sold until the 2012 cMP was discontinued as apple no longer had Mini DisplayPort computers in the chain.

The Thunderbolt Display cannot be driven by any DisplayPort connection, thunderbolt only. There’s a convoluted workaround to add thunderbolt to a cMP but I wouldn’t advise that method.
 

frilli

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jul 2, 2019
22
3
Thanks for the replies,

I have seen around the network that there are active converters from HDMI to Thunderbolt, from DVI to Thunderbolt etc .... do you think they can work?
 

tommy chen

macrumors 6502a
Oct 1, 2018
907
390
Thanks for the replies,

I have seen around the network that there are active converters from HDMI to Thunderbolt, from DVI to Thunderbolt etc .... do you think they can work?


no, without an TB chip it can't work

the only way is this (only for displays!):

TBdisplay_cMP.jpg



could work without windows!?!
 
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bosozoku

macrumors regular
Feb 23, 2018
227
112
Tokyo

JoeOIVOV

macrumors member
Apr 6, 2020
57
26
I did get this working buts its a bit buggy.

For example, sleep doesn't work correctly with a thunderbolt device plugged in so I need to unplug the Thunderbolt Display when I'm done working for the day, which is an annoying step. It consumes too much power at idle being from 2010 or earlier.
The Thunderbolt Display doesn't always come up when you power on the system, you need to unplug and replug it back in and wait 5-10 seconds for it to come on and then it requires a restart for the sound/webcam and brightness to work.

Its finicky but if you don't mind messing with restarts and unplugging it to get it work then its not a problem.

Once its working it doesn't fall off or flake out. It looks great, I run 2 thunderbolt display's in extended mode on my 5,1.

If anyone has any info to fix the issues I mentioned above I would love to fix them.
 

martyr

macrumors member
Jun 19, 2007
34
12
I did get this working buts its a bit buggy.

For example, sleep doesn't work correctly with a thunderbolt device plugged in so I need to unplug the Thunderbolt Display when I'm done working for the day, which is an annoying step. It consumes too much power at idle being from 2010 or earlier.
The Thunderbolt Display doesn't always come up when you power on the system, you need to unplug and replug it back in and wait 5-10 seconds for it to come on and then it requires a restart for the sound/webcam and brightness to work.

Its finicky but if you don't mind messing with restarts and unplugging it to get it work then its not a problem.

Once its working it doesn't fall off or flake out. It looks great, I run 2 thunderbolt display's in extended mode on my 5,1.

If anyone has any info to fix the issues I mentioned above I would love to fix them.
Wow, good job! I'm in a similar boat, trying to repurpose this otherwise beautiful Apple Thunderbolt Display.

Can you describe your setup and steps a bit more?
  1. What thunderbolt card are you using? Did you have to flash it and, if so, did you do it yourself or buy it like that?
  2. What version of macOS are you using?
  3. Did you have to install and use OpenCore?
  4. What Thunderbolt 3 to Thunderbolt 1/2 adapter did you use? Apple? StarTech?
  5. Do you need to boot into Windows first to warm boot the card and then boot into macOS?
Any details here would be great. Thanks!

Joshua
 

Hot_Freaks

macrumors newbie
Jun 17, 2020
6
1
I did get this working buts its a bit buggy.

For example, sleep doesn't work correctly with a thunderbolt device plugged in so I need to unplug the Thunderbolt Display when I'm done working for the day, which is an annoying step. It consumes too much power at idle being from 2010 or earlier.
The Thunderbolt Display doesn't always come up when you power on the system, you need to unplug and replug it back in and wait 5-10 seconds for it to come on and then it requires a restart for the sound/webcam and brightness to work.

Its finicky but if you don't mind messing with restarts and unplugging it to get it work then its not a problem.

Once its working it doesn't fall off or flake out. It looks great, I run 2 thunderbolt display's in extended mode on my 5,1.

If anyone has any info to fix the issues I mentioned above I would love to fix them.
Interesting, I have a 24" LED Cinema Display (A1267) that has the mini-dp input, and it behaves similarly with my 5,1.

My assumption is that at startup the logic board of the display is expecting a different signal than what the 5,1's GPU sends it. Perhaps something about the brightness level does not square up between the two at first. If I toggle the brightness on the keyboard while I'm unplugging/replugging the monitor's power supply cable it will on without restarting the computer. I haven't recorded my process so I just sort of finesse it a few times.

I pulled this out of the trash of an e-recycling business so who knows, but from what I see on other forums these monitors are plagued with sleep-wake problems.
 

hamishb2

macrumors member
Dec 12, 2020
33
13
I can warm boot into my 27" ATD using an Apple TB 2-> 3 adapter, hooked up to a Titan Ridge card in my Mac Pro.

However I can't cold boot.

OC 0.75 (Martin Lo package) with SSDT enabled and running Monterey.

Any ideas?
 

JoeOIVOV

macrumors member
Apr 6, 2020
57
26
I can warm boot into my 27" ATD using an Apple TB 2-> 3 adapter, hooked up to a Titan Ridge card in my Mac Pro.

However I can't cold boot.

OC 0.75 (Martin Lo package) with SSDT enabled and running Monterey.

Any ideas?

If you cold boot, all the features of the card doesn't work on a 5,1, like the sound or brightness control. I put in script that autorestarts it that first time and then comes back up correctly.
 

hamishb2

macrumors member
Dec 12, 2020
33
13
If you cold boot, all the features of the card doesn't work on a 5,1, like the sound or brightness control. I put in script that autorestarts it that first time and then comes back up correctly.
Could you please explain where I can find such a script? Presume requires auto login.
 

JoeOIVOV

macrumors member
Apr 6, 2020
57
26

Just edit the autorestarter.sh and put your own username, it works great.

If I just want it to do a single restart I just delete the temp file it creates in the profile folder and then reboot it, if the temp file is present it will reboot twice.
 
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