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Can I get more screen real estate on an external monitor?

I

Ibamac

macrumors member
Original poster
Aug 5, 2012
31
0
Hi, I just bought a refurbished 2012 11" MBA and I attached it to my Lenovo All-in-One Desktop using HDMI and the Belkin adapter. Works great, but I can't figure out how to take advantage of the 24" desktop screen. Is there a setting on the MBA which would allow me to take advantage of the larger screen (e.g., show more lines of text than appear on the MBA screen)? I tried the various resolutions listed on the MBA display settings to no avail - I get just get an enlarged mirror of exactly what's on the 11" screen. Clearly, I'm missing something obvious, as so many of you write that the 11" is no problem once you hook it up to an external monitor.

Also, speaking of displays - at Best Buy I could have sworn the desktop image of the galaxy was purple and black, but on my MBA, it's really a grayish blue with a yellow center. Does that sound right?

Brand new to mac - been watching the how to videos and reading support websites, but seem to overlooked the trick here.

Thank you!
 
Ibamac said:
Hi, I just bought a refurbished 2012 11" MBA and I attached it to my Lenovo All-in-One Desktop using HDMI and the Belkin adapter. Works great, but I can't figure out how to take advantage of the 24" desktop screen. Is there a setting on the MBA which would allow me to take advantage of the larger screen (e.g., show more lines of text than appear on the MBA screen)? I tried the various resolutions listed on the MBA display settings to no avail - I get just get an enlarged mirror of exactly what's on the 11" screen. Clearly, I'm missing something obvious, as so many of you write that the 11" is no problem once you hook it up to an external monitor.

Also, speaking of displays - at Best Buy I could have sworn the desktop image of the galaxy was purple and black, but on my MBA, it's really a grayish blue with a yellow center. Does that sound right?

Brand new to mac - been watching the how to videos and reading support websites, but seem to overlooked the trick here.

Thank you!
Click to expand...

the mountain lion bg is blue and yellow while lion's bg is purple and black
 
Bring up the Displays part of the System Preferences. There should be a checkbox for Mirroring Displays or not. Turn it off and the external monitor will be a separate desktop. Or you can plug the Mac in, use an external mouse and keyboard and close the laptop. Your computer will then use the external display as the primary monitor at full resolution.
 
Thank you, mfram. I'll try that. On the apple store page for the Belkin adapter I read that I need to change system preferences in the monitor (or the MBA?) in order for it to send sound through the display rather than the MBA (I have video, but no sound through the external monitor). Do you know what I'm supposed to set it to? I'm using a Lenovo B520 as an external monitor via HDMI. Thanks again!
 
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