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laliastudiocedric

macrumors member
Original poster
Jun 8, 2017
35
11
Hi
I use my 2011 iMac as a target display with target display mode with MacBook Pro.
Is target display always available on Catalina ?
 

McTinker

macrumors newbie
Feb 10, 2020
17
8
For what it's worth, a year after your stating the question; I have an 27" iMac 2012 run-in 10.15.6, connected to a MacBook Air 2017, also running 10.15.6, with a Apple thunderbolt 2 cable, and Target Display Mode works!
I have the impression that it works after the last update to 10.15.6 though.
 

Gaberdine

macrumors newbie
Jan 7, 2008
10
2
I'm currently using my 2013 iMac 27" running Catalina in TDM connected to a 2015 MacBook Air running High Sierra.

However, TDM only works when I'm not logged into a user account on the Catalina iMac. Either log out, switch user (without logging out), or just don't log in at all - it all works perfectly. However, switching to TDM from a logged in user account in Catalina doesn't display anything - the screen simply goes dark, despite the other Mac recognising that there is a display attached (it shows up in Displays System Pref). This is my experience of it. FWIW I'm connecting through a Thunderbolt dock, rather than directly.

So it works, but you can't run the TDM Mac as a headless machine in the background (as you could in eg High Sierra). Shame, as I used to run my iTunes from an earlier iMac in TDM.

In my experience, the Catalina Mac can connect to another Mac in Target Display mode - and I see no reason why it wouldn't, despite Apple saying it won't work.
 

Gaberdine

macrumors newbie
Jan 7, 2008
10
2
Update on my earlier comment

As of yesterday, TDM is now working even when logged into a Catalina user account.

I cannot fully account for this, but I suspect it is to do with changes made in recent security updates.
 
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