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5K2K at 120Hz with Mac Mini M4

OK now that it's been a week, I can confirm that for the most part this solution is working without any major issue. Refresh rate looks great, resolution is perfect, and color looks pretty much spot on now.

The only annoyance is that the display will not fully sleep. I have a "hot corner" setup so that when I intentionally swipe my mouse cursor to the very bottom right of the display, it will force the system to sleep. This does not really work. The Mac will indeed go into sleep more, but the LG display will stay visible with the prior state in a "frozen" mode. Any video/animations will be frozen and the screen will not actually sleep. I've come back to my computer 30 minutes after departing and it was in this state.

I've checked the right boxes within Better Display to help it sleep but none of those seemed to have worked.

Overall its a good solution for now.
 
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sboerup said:
OK now that it's been a week, I can confirm that for the most part this solution is working without any major issue. Refresh rate looks great, resolution is perfect, and color looks pretty much spot on now.

The only annoyance is that the display will not fully sleep. I have a "hot corner" setup so that when I intentionally swipe my mouse cursor to the very bottom right of the display, it will force the system to sleep. This does not really work. The Mac will indeed go into sleep more, but the LG display will stay visible with the prior state in a "frozen" mode. Any video/animations will be frozen and the screen will not actually sleep. I've come back to my computer 30 minutes after departing and it was in this state.

I've checked the right boxes within Better Display to help it sleep but none of those seemed to have worked.

Overall its a good solution for now.
Click to expand...

I have noticed the same. First, I thought it was a problem of the screensaver which suddenly was frozen, but then realised that what really happens is that when the computer goes into sleep, the screen really does not.

Apart from this, it seems that all other things look pretty good. I feared if I would notice any performance problem but it seems not.

On the other hand, a few days ago the update of macOS Sequoia 15.5 came out, I suppose it does not solve anything but I don't know if someone has noticed any difference.
 
The main issues were screensaver and lack of some video apps eg TV.

The display is also fixed to being 60Hz on the virtual output.

It also used to act up with my KVM occasionally but that was maybe 3% of the time.

I don’t regret switching to the Ultra as it has zero issues.
 
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Can someone explain this to me?

I went to my local Apple Store and they had an M3 Ultra(!) Mac Studio connected to a Studio Display.

Obviously the Studio Display does full 5120x2880 5K. The default (scaled) resolution on the M3 Ultra was 2560x1440, HiDPI, which is 1:2 - half of the full resolution in each dimension. (See attachment.)

On our 5120x2160 5K2K Ultrawide 21:9 monitors the default (if it exists!) is 3840x1620, which is 3:4 - not 1:2 (2560x1080).

I’m curious why the Studio Display (which presumably does not suffer from the unsupported-on-M4 3840x1620 HiDPI issue - although that resolution doesn’t show up either) uses 1:2 as the default, not 3:4 (which would be 3840x2160 - UHD/“4K”).

Is this purely a function of full 5K vs. 5K2K? Are there any other monitors out there that do full 5120x2880 5K, which also default to 2560x1440 HiDPI when connected to a Mac?
 

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Riot Nrrrd said:
Obviously the Studio Display does full 5120x2880 5K. The default (scaled) resolution on the M3 Ultra was 2560x1440, HiDPI, which is 1:2 - half of the full resolution in each dimension. (See attachment.)

On our 5120x2160 5K2K Ultrawide 21:9 monitors the default (if it exists!) is 3840x1620, which is 3:4 - not 1:2 (2560x1080).

I’m curious why the Studio Display (which presumably does not suffer from the unsupported-on-M4 3840x1620 HiDPI issue - although that resolution doesn’t show up either) uses 1:2 as the default, not 3:4 (which would be 3840x2160 - UHD/“4K”).
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I don't know. The EDID contains measurements for the display in millimeters or centimeters. Apple could use that in a DPI calculation.
The Studio Display maybe has a higher DPI so it uses 1:2 as the default.
The Ultrawide maybe has a lower DPI so it uses 3:4 as the default.

Alternative, Apple could decide that 1080 (half of 2160) is too low and choose the next higher number of vertical pixels.

I would check for any display override files and see if they have any preferences specified.
/System/Library/Displays/Contents/Resources/Overrides

Riot Nrrrd said:
Is this purely a function of full 5K vs. 5K2K? Are there any other monitors out there that do full 5120x2880 5K, which also default to 2560x1440 HiDPI when connected to a Mac?
Click to expand...
I think all 16:9 5K displays default to 2560x1440 HiDPI (LG UltraFine 5K, Dell UP2715K, etc.)
 
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Most of the time when I plug a 4k display to a Mac, the default is 1:2 1920x1080 HiDPI, even on the ones with lower PPI like a 32". In my place and I assume most people's home / work place, you get an assortment of 4K displays in various size and this behaviour is consistent.

So 1:2 default scaling seems to be the norm, at least for 16:9. With the 21:9 ultra wides I don't have enough experience to say it defaults to something else consistently.
 
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@Riot Nrrrd "Are there any other monitors out there that do full 5120x2880 5K, which also default to 2560x1440 HiDPI when connected to a Mac?"

Since up to now all available 5K 16:9 monitors are 27", all 5K 16:9 monitors follow Apple's iMac 27" standardisation of a default HiDPI screen resolution of 2560x1440.

Since Apple standardises it's external monitor panels on 218dpi, I would guess @joevt's suggestion that if a monitor's dpi is lower, then a different default scaling will be chosen?

Especially since 5K 21:9 monitors are essentially one-and-a-half 4K panels joined side-by-side, so lower pixel density.
 
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Hi all,
I'm planning to buy a 5K2K monitor to use with my Mac mini M4 (the base version), and I'm trying to avoid any potential scaling issues — particularly the kind where HiDPI 3840x1620 mode is not available or text appears blurry.
I've read that LG monitor(40WP95C) which I wanted to buy in the first place has these problems. Does anyone have experience with the Dell U4025QW or similar displays? Does it work well with macOS in terms of scaling, HiDPI support?
Thanks for any insights!

edit: just to clarify more: This will be for office work only and multitasking — I don’t need any gaming features etc, just a large screen with a 21:9 aspect ratio and proper macOS compatibility.
 
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wigw said:
Does anyone have experience with the Dell U4025QW or similar displays? Does it work well with macOS in terms of scaling, HiDPI support?
Click to expand...
I don't have any personal experience with that particular Dell (not having the desktop space for a 40" monitor, plus I dislike curved screens), but after extensive reading of these Macrumors forums and the Apple Support boards, it seems like people that own one are pretty darn happy with theirs.
 
Riot Nrrrd said:
Another too-big-for-my-desk, curved 5K2K monitor. Le sigh …
Click to expand...
LG's WOLED roadmap is projecting 2025Q4 for 34" and 39" 5k2k 240Hz, both are still curved, but a bit more manageable width-wise. The 34" is also at the same PPI as a 27" 4k which probably crosses the sharpness sweetspot for most people's vision.

Honestly at this moment in time the safest bet is to just get the already available 27" 4k 16:9 OLED though. Especially concerning the issues outline in this thread for the ultrawides.
 
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Chancha said:
LG's WOLED roadmap is projecting 2025Q4 for 34" and 39" 5k2k 240Hz, both are still curved, but a bit more manageable width-wise. The 34" is also at the same PPI as a 27" 4k which probably crosses the sharpness sweetspot for most people's vision.

Honestly at this moment in time the safest bet is to just get the already available 27" 4k 16:9 OLED though. Especially concerning the issues outline in this thread for the ultrawides.
Click to expand...
164 ppi (considered Retina at 21") is very good but not top tier IMO. I have such a monitor now, although it's actually 3840x2560 and 28.2", so it's same pixel density as a 27" 4K, but taller.
 
EugW said:
164 ppi (considered Retina at 21") is very good but not top tier IMO. I have such a monitor now, although it's actually 3840x2560 and 28.2", so it's same pixel density as a 27" 4K, but taller.
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Samsung's 5k 220PPI QD-OLED panel was revealed in CES and then last month shown a demo unit in Taiwan Computex. I strongly feel like this is made for Apple being the first customer, to be used in ASD2.
 
Am I the only person who feels straitjacketed by this? I’ve spent countless hours poring over Web sites looking at various Macs, only to hesitate on pulling the trigger at the last second.

I don’t want to buy an M4-based Mac and deal with workarounds like Virtual Displays in BetterDisplay.

I don’t want to buy an M3-based MacBook Pro because it’s a year and a half old and the M5s will be here in a few months.

I don’t want to buy an M3 Ultra Mac Studio because it’s double the cost and complete overkill for my modest use case.

I don’t want to get a different monitor that works (like the Dell 40”) because I already paid a bunch of money for my 34” LG 5K2K Ultrawide.

I keep praying for a software fix and now we know macOS Tahoe probably won’t fix it. 😞

If I had any hair left, I’d pull it out. 🤬
 
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T'hain Esh Kelch said:
Remember that is the production timeline. Actual displays on the market is likely first around mid-late spring 2026, similar to how the 45" panel ended up.
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Right. But then at least these displays being actual products are going to be released within line of sight, and that being OLED is such a significant advantage over the IPS that a 1-2 year of wait time considering our knowledge of their existence is I think reasonable. Especially concerning the Samsung 5120x2880 120Hz QD-OLED panel, it being a direct but massive upgrade from what is now in the ASD.
 
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