MacBook Air external display woes

[TomOSeven]

Hi all,

I'm going nuts trying to figure out what's wrong with my MacBook Air.

On my Windows laptop I have hooked up an external monitor via USB-C. On Windows, I can run the monitor at 1440p / 144 Hertz with HDR at 150% scaling factor so everything's crisp but also large enough to use.

On my Macbook Air, I can only choose EITHER (1440p + HDR) OR (120 Hertz + 1080p) (not even the full 144 Hz, though I don't see the difference at that point), plus there is no scaling option. Well, there is one, but that involves turning down the resolution, which makes things very blurry 1080p doesn't look good on a 27" display.

So my two options are:

1. Nice, crisp resolution and great colors but everything's tiny and runs at a low refresh rate
2. Everything's large enough and runs at 120 Hz but looks blurry

The internal display supports display scaling without blurriness, why doesn't the external one?

I don't get why things on the external display so much worse than on Windows. The Windows laptop doesn't even have full Thunderbolt 3.1 I think, and yet the display throughput seems a lot higher.

So there seem to be two limits here:

1. USB-C port only throughputs at HDMI levels, not at displayport levels
2. No real scaling options in MacOS on an external display.

This is driving me nuts.

 

[badsimian]

What is the monitor? What cable are you using? What options do you see when you hold down the option key and click on the radio button for resolutions?

 

[TomOSeven]

BenQ EX2780Q, and I'm using the included USB-C cable for both my Macbook and my Windows laptop (and my company's work laptop).

The resolutions I'm seeing:

3840x2160 (only at 30 Hz for some reason)
2560x1440 (native resolution), only at 60 Hz
1920x1080 (120 Hz option)
1600x900
1280x720

No extra options appear when holding the option button, only a "Detect Displays" button shows up.

 

[TomOSeven]

According to Apple's website, the M1 should support 6k at 60 Hz, that's WAY more than 1440p 120 Hz... I don't understand why this won't work.

The scaling issue is even more infuriating, how is that not a common problem? Do people exclusively buy Apple approved 4k displays for their Macbooks?

 

[Merlin1201]

Did you try that ALT and check scaled (even when it's checked) it gives that extra resolution.

 

[TomOSeven]

Nothing happens when I press the alt button:

No extra options appear when holding the option button, only a "Detect Displays" button shows up.

 

[jdb8167]

Nothing happens when I press the alt button:

Hold the option key when clicking on Scaled. It doesn't appear automatically by pressing the key like the Detect Displays button does.

 

[Kung gu]

It works for him.

 

[Kung gu]

Also the cable are using to connect to external display is it:

1) USB C to HDMI

OR

2) USB C to DP

 

[Kung gu]

According to Apple's website, the M1 should support 6k at 60 Hz, that's WAY more than 1440p 120 Hz... I don't understand why this won't work.

The scaling issue is even more infuriating, how is that not a common problem? Do people exclusively buy Apple approved 4k displays for their Macbooks?

Non-Apple approved displays still work and should function as normal.

Scaling on Macs is not a problem, in fact its better than Windows scaling IMO.

 

[TomOSeven]

It works for him.

Well, the monitor works for me as well. It works with my gaming laptop and my 400 € work laptop.

He uses a Macbook with a dedicated GPU and apparently does 100% scaling, so not sure how helpful that is.

 

[TomOSeven]

Scaling on Macs is not a problem, in fact its better than Windows scaling IMO.

What does that even mean? There isn't even an option anywhere to do fractional scaling like on Windows on Linux, all you can do is lower the resolution.

 

[Kung gu]

What does that even mean? There isn't even an option anywhere to do fractional scaling like on Windows on Linux, all you can do is lower the resolution.

It should work, 1440p 144htz is supported on macOS.

What cable are you using to connect?
HDMI or DP.

I would use a DisplayPort Cable, as Display port to usb-c supports 1440hz at 2k.

 

[TomOSeven]

I'm using a USB-C to USB-C cable that supports displayport and came with the monitor.

The same cable that does 144 hz / 1440p on my Windows machines without problem.

 

[TomOSeven]

What external monitor and size combinations provide best scaling on macOS?

I am trying to get an external monitor for my MacBook. I have two requirements: Items on the monitor will be about the same size as items on the MacBook screen Text and other objects will not be b...

apple.stackexchange.com

A thread going into this issue a bit more in depth.

That explains what's going on on the scaling front:

Apple does support 2x scaling on certain monitors, but only their own ones or that of vendors that sell more expensive monitors. If you have an "unsupported" screen with identical dimensions and resolutions, you're simply out of luck. Again, the "solution" is to spend more money. Brilliant.

I don't even care about the weird issue with the missing displayport throughput anymore, the fact that OSX stops me from using display scaling on an external monitor, just because Apple doesn't get a kickback from BenQ like they get from their LG partners is just off-putting. The fact that scaling, resolution and 1440p work perfectly on my ****** HP work laptop just adds insult to injury.

 

[Kung gu]

Use this app:

Releases · usr-sse2/RDM

Easily set Mac Retina display to higher unsupported resolutions - usr-sse2/RDM

github.com

RDM is a good program and should hopefully solve ur problem

You should prefer resolutions marked with ⚡️ (lightning), which indicates the resolution is HiDPI or 2× or more dense in pixels.

edit: added a better app

 

[Kung gu]

Hey @TomOSeven, found a guy on YouTube using a external monitor that is 4k 144hertz compliant
and this guy has a MacBook Air M1 too and is he getting the full 4k 144htz.

He is using a LG monitor but this monitor is not supported by Apple and is not just for Macs.

27-inch UltraGear Gaming Monitor - 27GN950-B | LG USA

Discover the 27-inch UltraGear Gaming Monitor that features Nano IPS Display and G-SYNC® Compatibility. Find reviews, specs, and more for 27GN950-B.

www.lg.com

its a gaming monitor too, so I would not expect apple to support this. ?

My guess is that your BenQ and M1 is having display driver problems.

 

[Kung gu]

What external monitor and size combinations provide best scaling on macOS?

I am trying to get an external monitor for my MacBook. I have two requirements: Items on the monitor will be about the same size as items on the MacBook screen Text and other objects will not be b...

apple.stackexchange.com

A thread going into this issue a bit more in depth.

That explains what's going on on the scaling front:

Apple does support 2x scaling on certain monitors, but only their own ones or that of vendors that sell more expensive monitors. If you have an "unsupported" screen with identical dimensions and resolutions, you're simply out of luck. Again, the "solution" is to spend more money. Brilliant.

I don't even care about the weird issue with the missing displayport throughput anymore, the fact that OSX stops me from using display scaling on an external monitor, just because Apple doesn't get a kickback from BenQ like they get from their LG partners is just off-putting. The fact that scaling, resolution and 1440p work perfectly on my ****** HP work laptop just adds insult to injury.

I don't agree with this statement. "Scaling" in macOS means the user interface is sized the same as 1080p, but it's becomes twice as sharp as it's actually 4K. Think "Retina Display" basically. Makes everything look nicer, without making words and such too small to be usable.

So if u have a 4k display and use Display settings to scale it down to "1080p", it is not 1080p but the display looks
like 1080p but is actually much shaper.

and this applies to external monitors supported and not supported by Apple.

 

[TomOSeven]

Why do you have to lie on Apple's behalf?

It doesn't apply to all monitors, the downscaled 1080p on my 1440k monitor looks like arse, you can barely read a couple hundred words without the eyes hurting because the font is so blurry.

You can find hundreds of people talking about that online if you google, just because you apparently have an Apple approved laptop doesn't mean it works with every monitor.

That fact is, my 1440p monitor is miles sharper on Windows, yet you keep coming into the thread to tell me I'm not actually having the problem I'm having.

I do appreciate you taking the time to look up RDM, alas it doesn't give me any options I don't already have in the display settings.

 

[TomOSeven]

its a gaming monitor too, so I would not expect apple to support this. ?

What does it matter if it's designated as a gaming monitor? Apparently Windows has a standard that just allows every monitor to be used at whichever scaling you want, so how is Apple's policy of "only supporting select monitors" better for the consumer? Mind you, this is the second monitor this is happening on, image quality on my Thinkvision T25m (1080p at 25") was even more dreadful, and that's decidedly not a gaming monitor.

This guy has been testing the M1 Macbooks on numerous displays and seems to have the same issues:

 

[Sheppard]

Chill, people are trying to help. Download SwitchResX

 

[TomOSeven]

Chill, people are trying to help. Download SwitchResX

And I really appreciate the help.

I'll see if SwitchResX unlocks anything useful, otherwise I'll just return the MacBook.

 

[TomOSeven]

This has got to be a driver issue.

Until now, I only tried two configurations:

1. USB-C to USB-C
2. Displayport via my USB-C hub.

Both of them should communicate via displayport, right?

I now connected an HDMI cable to my hub and voila, I get the full 1440p 144 Hz.

Now the "only" problem left is the damn scaling.

 

[Zazoh]

I went through this when I had a non-silicon Mac Mini. Tried 3 monitors ordered off Amazon from various vendors before paying for an LG 4K monitor that Apple sold. It cost as much as the Mini.

Now that I have the MBA M1, the resolution and text are still great.

I’ve found is some folks are way more forgiving of text blurry-ness than others. I’d rather just not use a monitor than put up with it.

There may be folks out there that have found a way to make it work, but my solution was to go with what Apple had at the time.

 

[TomOSeven]

That certainly explains why they have made no effort (the scaling problem goes back to 2015 from what I can tell) to fix the issue. People would rather pay twice the price for a monitor from Apple than not use an Apple product.