Mac Pro Mid 2010 - How to run 4k TV

[Sohaib Najam]

Hi, long story short, I bought a samsung 4k 40" TV just to try it out and it looked great, however, my current Mac Pro is using a Gtx 680, so it doesn't have HDMI 2.0 like the newer 900 series does, thus I'm stuck at 24hz. My question is: has anyone tried to run a 4k TV over HDMI 2.0 since TV's don't usually have display port, with Nvidia's newer 900 series. Thanks.

I don't want to end up spending over $200-300 to get a new gpu to find out it can't drive it at 60Hz.

Thanks.

 

[MacVidCards]

GTX970/80 can do it.

Question is whether it has been turned on in 10.10.3

There was some improvement in HDMI in 10.10.3, so a big "maybe" until someone confirms.

Boot into Windows and it should work.

 

[Sohaib Najam]

I see. Well I'm going to have to wait until the end of this year until I upgrade my gpu, by then hopefully the 900 series drops in price a little bit. And maybe, Apple will add support in 10.11 whatever they end up calling it.

 

[benjaprud]

I use a Panasonic 4K TV which used to be driven by a GTX680 via DisplayPort 1.2. It was stuck at 25Hz with the default Apple driver and 30Hz with the nVidia Webdriver.

I changed recently for a Titan X which now drives the TV over HDMI 2.0 (it didn't work using DP with Windows for some unknown reason). The situation is still the same. Now I have a lot of weird resolutions available (not really useful ones, just clogging the list) but still stuck at 30Hz.

4K@60Hz works out of the box on Windows with both cards though.

My TV seems to use MST in 4K@60Hz mode on DP. I'm not sure how this works with HDMI 2.0 as MST seems to be exclusive to DisplayPort. If I deactivate MST mode in the menus I'm stuck at 30Hz on both MacOS and Windows using DP.

 

[panluegg]

Apple will add support in 10.11 whatever they end up calling it.

 

[NOTNlCE]

I have older cards - GTX 660s - they drive my Acer B286HK UHD monitor just fine with the Web Drivers. OS X drivers that come native in Yosemite stick it at 30Hz, but Web Drivers let me run 60Hz just fine.

Connected via DisplayPort 1.2

 

[benjaprud]

Does your monitor use SST or MST mode ? I guess it is possible with SST monitors as MST support on MacOS is still restricted to the latest mac models. Using a TV is not as straightforward as a monitor as there are fewer settings to control the way DP behaves (and TVs with DP are rare), and there is barely any information about 4k@60Hz on SST/MST support in the technical documentations. TV users just don't care, there is no physical 4K source for them at the moment anyway (except for a PC). It seems also that the system treats TVs differently than monitors although I don't know in which way.

HDMI 2 support would be nice and it may come in the future but Apple may want to restrict it to newer macs to try to force us into buying one (which I won't, I'll go for something else).

 

[MacVidCards]

Benjaprud, have you tried the MST 4K enabling hack I have posted in another thread?

I also put it on our blog. If your TV (880?) is using MST the hack should work.

The only fiddly part is at each boot you need to start in HDMI mode then switch to DP.

I have been considering one of those TVs to test HDMI 2.0. I imagine it will be enabled sooner than later. Or maybe already is and needs a hack....

 

[benjaprud]

I've tried your hack without success (that was after the 10.10.1 update and before the switching connections trick), I may try again one of these days but for now I'm OK with 30Hz. I really need 60Hz under Windows but it would be surely appreciated under MacOS for smooth mouse cursor movement and web scrolling.

I reboot a lot between MacOS and Win so I'm not really pleased with switching connections. Switching from DP to HDMI is a pain because each time the system loses the wallpaper and default resolution which leads to black screen on my TV and a hassle to recover everything under both OS. I do hope that your hack gets easier with each system update or that an official solution comes to light.

My TV (Panasonic TX50AX800) can be switched between SST or automatic SST/MST modes. I can't explicitly force it into MST.

 

[Sohaib Najam]

Yeah, that's the problem with TV's, OSX had some weird resolutions all the way above 7000 x 4000 something and at 24Hz with a 680, the mouse cursor was just unbearable, went back to my old 32" 1080p Samsung TV. To be blunt for some reason I never liked monitors, don't know why but I'm stuck between selling my 2010 MP and either getting the 2nd gen iMac retina hopefully which doesn't throttle as hard or a MBP 15 and hooking it up to my TV/Monitor for native 4k support. I don't want to ditch the Mac Pro, however, looking at the current trends and the way it's going I have a feeling I'll end up with the iMac as at least you can still get fusion drive so don't need an external hooked in all of the time.

Overall, pretty confused over what decision I'll end up making since I have a feeling Apple will within the next 2-3 years drop support for the older Mac Pro's the way this is going.

 

[benjaprud]

Did you try with the nVidia webdriver ? 24 to 30Hz doesn't seem much but it is a real improvement that made the thing bearable for me, not smooth but usable. TVs are the only way to go if you want a very large screen, which I use for best immersion in games. It's also great for movies and 4k really makes sense on big screens.

 

[Sohaib Najam]

I did, I've always had the web driver enabled and selected. Regardless too late now anyways, returned it as this was only an experiment to see how 4k would look.

 

[MacVidCards]

I've tried your hack without success (that was after the 10.10.1 update and before the switching connections trick), I may try again one of these days but for now I'm OK with 30Hz. I really need 60Hz under Windows but it would be surely appreciated under MacOS for smooth mouse cursor movement and web scrolling.

It was broken in 10.10.1, working again