macOS/Mac Studio display management is driving me insane. No, really.

[sebalvarez]

I have two Dell P2715Q monitors that I use frequently and a Vizio P65Q9-J01 TV set that I use on occasion, sometimes as a monitor for editing video, and lately because it's the only way I can output 5.1 audio to my receiver without having to buy an expensive audio interface. The HDMI cable from my Mac Studio doesn't go straight to the TV set, it goes directly to my Yamaha RX-V683, but the video is not processed by the receiver, it bypasses to the TV set, to the point that in both the display and sound settings, you only see the name of the TV set. Only if I disconnect the HDMI cable that goes from the receiver to the TV set, I see Yamaha in those settings.

First off, I'm aware that these three displays are pieces of garbage, but it's what I have now, so please don't give me any suggestions to buy another display and TV set, it's not gonna happen.

Now, I don't know what the Apple engineers were thinking, but I'm about to blow a fuse. This computer, this $5,000 Mac Studio that is a beast of a machine, decides to assign placement and resolutions as it pleases, completely disregarding what the user had set before. And even worse, it does it every single time I connect and switch to these devices.

Let's forget about the Vizio for a moment. When I only use the two Dells, for some reason it decided that the one in front of me is always the number 2 display, and the one to the left is number 1. I can switch cables all day long, but the display manager shows them that way, even if the first monitor I ever plugged in to this machine, is the one that it calls (2). And that is a minor annoyance, I just don't get it at all. But I also use these two monitors for work, connected to a Macbook Pro, since these monitors have three inputs, Display Port, mini Display Port, and HDMI. So two USB-C to Display Port cables go from my Mac Studio to the two monitors, then two USB-C to mini Display Port cables for the Macbook Pro, plus an HDMI cable from my PC to one of the monitors.

Well, sometimes I don't need to use two monitors for whatever I'm doing for work, and I would like to have my front monitor showing me the Macbook Pro, then the left monitor showing me the Mac Studio. Well, this works fine sometimes but most times, if I want that layout, I need to go into the display settings of my Mac Studio, and set the other monitor to main. But OK, this is annoying, not infuriating. Here's what is:

When I want the three at the same time, the Mac Studio decides that the Vizio TV is the main display and all others are mirrors. This happens every single time, it never saves what I specified last time. And this is especially infuriating when it also happens when I switch inputs in the Yamaha, let's say to go from my Blu-ray player to my Apple TV. This triggers another damn HDMI handshake or some crap like that, and suddenly, my two Dell monitors show everything really big and sometimes it shows the same thing on both and all my desktop icons and the dock and all that (that's when it decides to mirror) and other times it shows everything huge but only the menu bar on the top, which is when it decides to make the Vizio the main display, and the other two, extended displays.

I'm about to punch this machine. I mean, this company makes some of the best hardware in the world, and even if my monitors and TV set are cheap pieces of crap, are you going to tell me that Apple's engineers didn't program macOS' display management to save what the user had set their resolutions to, and the placement of each monitor? Why would they assume that the user that plugs in a TV set wants to make said TV set their main display, and the other two mirrors of it, or sometimes extended displays?

I love Apple, I'm not one of those fan boys that get upset when people criticize them because they have plenty to be criticized for. But I also admire how much they have advanced the world of computing recently and all their devices interconnecting, which is one of the reason I like them and spend a lot of money in their products. But it irritates me to no end that they can't figure out something as simple as this. I mean, it's so easy. Whatever the user set a monitor to, scaling and placement, just don't change it! It's as simple as that! And if you add a second, then third monitor, ask the user what to do the first time, and then save those choices and don't automatically change them.

So, is anyone else putting up with this? And more importantly, is there a free or cheap software that will force macOS to save the display settings and never ever touch them again?

 

[BanditoB]

This appears to be a well-known issue, but I'm not sure if there's a definitive answer for fixing it. You can see what this thread has to say: https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...ed.2320211/page-6?post=31312749#post-31312749

Ultimately, I'd call Apple Support to see what they can do for you. If nothing else, it will make them aware of the issue.

 

[handheldgames]

I have two Dell P2715Q monitors that I use frequently and a Vizio P65Q9-J01 TV set that I use on occasion, sometimes as a monitor for editing video, and lately because it's the only way I can output 5.1 audio to my receiver without having to buy an expensive audio interface. The HDMI cable from my Mac Studio doesn't go straight to the TV set, it goes directly to my Yamaha RX-V683, but the video is not processed by the receiver, it bypasses to the TV set, to the point that in both the display and sound settings, you only see the name of the TV set. Only if I disconnect the HDMI cable that goes from the receiver to the TV set, I see Yamaha in those settings.

First off, I'm aware that these three displays are pieces of garbage, but it's what I have now, so please don't give me any suggestions to buy another display and TV set, it's not gonna happen.

Now, I don't know what the Apple engineers were thinking, but I'm about to blow a fuse. This computer, this $5,000 Mac Studio that is a beast of a machine, decides to assign placement and resolutions as it pleases, completely disregarding what the user had set before. And even worse, it does it every single time I connect and switch to these devices.

Let's forget about the Vizio for a moment. When I only use the two Dells, for some reason it decided that the one in front of me is always the number 2 display, and the one to the left is number 1. I can switch cables all day long, but the display manager shows them that way, even if the first monitor I ever plugged in to this machine, is the one that it calls (2). And that is a minor annoyance, I just don't get it at all. But I also use these two monitors for work, connected to a Macbook Pro, since these monitors have three inputs, Display Port, mini Display Port, and HDMI. So two USB-C to Display Port cables go from my Mac Studio to the two monitors, then two USB-C to mini Display Port cables for the Macbook Pro, plus an HDMI cable from my PC to one of the monitors.

Well, sometimes I don't need to use two monitors for whatever I'm doing for work, and I would like to have my front monitor showing me the Macbook Pro, then the left monitor showing me the Mac Studio. Well, this works fine sometimes but most times, if I want that layout, I need to go into the display settings of my Mac Studio, and set the other monitor to main. But OK, this is annoying, not infuriating. Here's what is:

When I want the three at the same time, the Mac Studio decides that the Vizio TV is the main display and all others are mirrors. This happens every single time, it never saves what I specified last time. And this is especially infuriating when it also happens when I switch inputs in the Yamaha, let's say to go from my Blu-ray player to my Apple TV. This triggers another damn HDMI handshake or some crap like that, and suddenly, my two Dell monitors show everything really big and sometimes it shows the same thing on both and all my desktop icons and the dock and all that (that's when it decides to mirror) and other times it shows everything huge but only the menu bar on the top, which is when it decides to make the Vizio the main display, and the other two, extended displays.

I'm about to punch this machine. I mean, this company makes some of the best hardware in the world, and even if my monitors and TV set are cheap pieces of crap, are you going to tell me that Apple's engineers didn't program macOS' display management to save what the user had set their resolutions to, and the placement of each monitor? Why would they assume that the user that plugs in a TV set wants to make said TV set their main display, and the other two mirrors of it, or sometimes extended displays?

I love Apple, I'm not one of those fan boys that get upset when people criticize them because they have plenty to be criticized for. But I also admire how much they have advanced the world of computing recently and all their devices interconnecting, which is one of the reason I like them and spend a lot of money in their products. But it irritates me to no end that they can't figure out something as simple as this. I mean, it's so easy. Whatever the user set a monitor to, scaling and placement, just don't change it! It's as simple as that! And if you add a second, then third monitor, ask the user what to do the first time, and then save those choices and don't automatically change them.

So, is anyone else putting up with this? And more importantly, is there a free or cheap software that will force macOS to save the display settings and never ever touch them again?

SwitchResX will fix your issues.

 

[sebalvarez]

SwitchResX will fix your issues.

Thanks. I've been trying out SwitchResX for a few weeks since you posted, and it kind of works sometimes. At least it takes care of the resolution problem by creating a display set and assigning a shortcut to it, so when things go crazy, at least I can return back to normal that way.

But what it doesn't do, and this I checked with the programmer, is to tell all the open apps which monitor is the main one. So this damn Vizio POS, for some reason, decides it's the king and when the computer wakes up from sleep, it sucks in all the apps that were open in my regular main monitor, the Dell right in front of me.

So at that point, I either have to unplug the HDMI cable, or move all the windows of all the apps to my main monitor. I wouldn't put it past Vizio that they put some kind of code to suck all the apps since it's a horrible TV set that has a mind of its own, but Apple shouldn't allow this, it should keep the user's preferences instead of allowing something like this to happen.

Anyone knows of any other app that can force the open apps to stay in the main monitor no matter what?

 

[xraydoc]

Thanks. I've been trying out SwitchResX for a few weeks since you posted, and it kind of works sometimes. At least it takes care of the resolution problem by creating a display set and assigning a shortcut to it, so when things go crazy, at least I can return back to normal that way.

But what it doesn't do, and this I checked with the programmer, is to tell all the open apps which monitor is the main one. So this damn Vizio POS, for some reason, decides it's the king and when the computer wakes up from sleep, it sucks in all the apps that were open in my regular main monitor, the Dell right in front of me.

So at that point, I either have to unplug the HDMI cable, or move all the windows of all the apps to my main monitor. I wouldn't put it past Vizio that they put some kind of code to suck all the apps since it's a horrible TV set that has a mind of its own, but Apple shouldn't allow this, it should keep the user's preferences instead of allowing something like this to happen.

Anyone knows of any other app that can force the open apps to stay in the main monitor no matter what?

What I think happens is that macOS tries to learn which display is which based on a unique code/serial number provided by the display itself. If it can't find that code, or if two identical displays do not have unique codes, then macOS cannot always tell which display is which. I've read something along these lines, though can't recall exactly where.

I can tell you that my Mac knows which of my two Studio Displays is which. I've got a 14" MacBook Pro and macOS always puts the right display in the right place whenever I dock my laptop. I believe it's using the display's serial number to know which one is which.

 

[sebalvarez]

I can tell you that my Mac knows which of my two Studio Displays is which. I've got a 14" MacBook Pro and macOS always puts the right display in the right place whenever I dock my laptop. I believe it's using the display's serial number to know which one is which.

I'm sure it does, and while I love Apple, that's the kind of thing that pisses me off about them. People shouldn't have to buy an insanely expensive display so they can get coherent behavior. There are plenty of standards, SDKs and so on, and even going to the most basic level, macOS can identify each display by a name or serial number or something like that. So it's as simple as keeping that monitor as the main one designated by the user, and not let any other display remove that setting from it and cause chaos in the display settings.

 

[AlteMac]

Can't you set the main monitor in system preferences/displays by dragging the icons there?

 

[sebalvarez]

Can't you set the main monitor in system preferences/displays by dragging the icons there?

Yes, not by dragging the icons, that just determines the position, but by right clicking and choosing "Main display". But that doesn't matter since the moment I connect the TV set to the HDMI output, it turns to mirror mode, and when I disable mirroring, it decides to set the TV set as main display, moving all the windows of all the apps I had open to the TV set because it's now the main display.

 

[handheldgames]

I have two Dell P2715Q monitors that I use frequently and a Vizio P65Q9-J01 TV set that I use on occasion, sometimes as a monitor for editing video, and lately because it's the only way I can output 5.1 audio to my receiver without having to buy an expensive audio interface. The HDMI cable from my Mac Studio doesn't go straight to the TV set, it goes directly to my Yamaha RX-V683, but the video is not processed by the receiver, it bypasses to the TV set, to the point that in both the display and sound settings, you only see the name of the TV set. Only if I disconnect the HDMI cable that goes from the receiver to the TV set, I see Yamaha in those settings.

First off, I'm aware that these three displays are pieces of garbage, but it's what I have now, so please don't give me any suggestions to buy another display and TV set, it's not gonna happen.

Now, I don't know what the Apple engineers were thinking, but I'm about to blow a fuse. This computer, this $5,000 Mac Studio that is a beast of a machine, decides to assign placement and resolutions as it pleases, completely disregarding what the user had set before. And even worse, it does it every single time I connect and switch to these devices.

Let's forget about the Vizio for a moment. When I only use the two Dells, for some reason it decided that the one in front of me is always the number 2 display, and the one to the left is number 1. I can switch cables all day long, but the display manager shows them that way, even if the first monitor I ever plugged in to this machine, is the one that it calls (2). And that is a minor annoyance, I just don't get it at all. But I also use these two monitors for work, connected to a Macbook Pro, since these monitors have three inputs, Display Port, mini Display Port, and HDMI. So two USB-C to Display Port cables go from my Mac Studio to the two monitors, then two USB-C to mini Display Port cables for the Macbook Pro, plus an HDMI cable from my PC to one of the monitors.

Well, sometimes I don't need to use two monitors for whatever I'm doing for work, and I would like to have my front monitor showing me the Macbook Pro, then the left monitor showing me the Mac Studio. Well, this works fine sometimes but most times, if I want that layout, I need to go into the display settings of my Mac Studio, and set the other monitor to main. But OK, this is annoying, not infuriating. Here's what is:

When I want the three at the same time, the Mac Studio decides that the Vizio TV is the main display and all others are mirrors. This happens every single time, it never saves what I specified last time. And this is especially infuriating when it also happens when I switch inputs in the Yamaha, let's say to go from my Blu-ray player to my Apple TV. This triggers another damn HDMI handshake or some crap like that, and suddenly, my two Dell monitors show everything really big and sometimes it shows the same thing on both and all my desktop icons and the dock and all that (that's when it decides to mirror) and other times it shows everything huge but only the menu bar on the top, which is when it decides to make the Vizio the main display, and the other two, extended displays.

I'm about to punch this machine. I mean, this company makes some of the best hardware in the world, and even if my monitors and TV set are cheap pieces of crap, are you going to tell me that Apple's engineers didn't program macOS' display management to save what the user had set their resolutions to, and the placement of each monitor? Why would they assume that the user that plugs in a TV set wants to make said TV set their main display, and the other two mirrors of it, or sometimes extended displays?

I love Apple, I'm not one of those fan boys that get upset when people criticize them because they have plenty to be criticized for. But I also admire how much they have advanced the world of computing recently and all their devices interconnecting, which is one of the reason I like them and spend a lot of money in their products. But it irritates me to no end that they can't figure out something as simple as this. I mean, it's so easy. Whatever the user set a monitor to, scaling and placement, just don't change it! It's as simple as that! And if you add a second, then third monitor, ask the user what to do the first time, and then save those choices and don't automatically change them.

So, is anyone else putting up with this? And more importantly, is there a free or cheap software that will force macOS to save the display settings and never ever touch them again?

SwitchResX

 

[sparkie7]

Could it be that Apple makes it a tough time connecting non-apple displays for commercial reasons? Just say’in….

 

[MacGizmo]

Could it be that Apple makes it a tough time connecting non-apple displays for commercial reasons? Just say’in….

 

[lowendlinux]

Could it be that Apple makes it a tough time connecting non-apple displays for commercial reasons? Just say’in….

Yup Apple makes it super tough to connect non-apple display's

 

[Killerbob]

In my experience these issues are VERY monitor/connection related. I have tried two Apple Thunderbolt Displays and no problems with my 2013 Mac Pro. I then tried two Dell monitors (via DP) on my 2019 Mac Pro with lots of issues, and I about gave up trying to figure it out. However, when I upgraded to two LG Thunderbolt monitors all was good in the world, and now that I use the two LG TB monitors on my Mac Studio, all is working fine.

An issue I had was that the setup would default to 30Hz, and only when I installed SwitchResX, does it default to 60Hz.

The two LG TB are daisy-chained, and run off one TB port on the Mac Studio. They are both 4K, and one is landscape and the other portrait. The only irritation is that I cannot assign specific names to the monitors in macOS, and hence if I assign sound to the “LG Monitor”, I don’t know which one… I have assigned specific names in SwitchResX, but that does not carry over to macOS.

 

[StuAff]

Hope you find a solution. P2715Qs are most definitely not garbage, anything but. With regards to 5,1 output, you could buy a USB to optical output for not much money-I have this- though no good for lossless formats like TrueHD.