Adding more thunderbolt ports to Mac Mini?

[thoang77]

Upon looking into it, there's no way to have an open thunderbolt port if I use a mini-displayport monitor is there? All of the hubs available have only 2 thunderbolt ports, so one in and one out, which is the case with my Lacie Thunderbolt drive as well. This renders me unable to use any single thunderbolt peripherals, which is pretty disappointing.

 

[PhiLLoW]

Sorry....what?


Mac Mini has two Thunderbolt ports. Just put the thunderbolt display on port 1 and whatever you need on port two. You can also daisychain harddrives or other thunderbolt devices.

 

[laurihoefs]

Sorry....what?


Mac Mini has two Thunderbolt ports. Just put the thunderbolt display on port 1 and whatever you need on port two. You can also daisychain harddrives or other thunderbolt devices.

2011 and 2012 Mac Minis only have a single Thunderbolt port, only the current Mini has two. The OP did not specify which model is in question, but I assume its not the 2014 model.

Upon looking into it, there's no way to have an open thunderbolt port if I use a mini-displayport monitor is there? All of the hubs available have only 2 thunderbolt ports, so one in and one out, which is the case with my Lacie Thunderbolt drive as well. This renders me unable to use any single thunderbolt peripherals, which is pretty disappointing.

Unfortunately you are correct. You can daisy chain Thunderbolt devices, but there are no splitters or hubs.

If your display has any other inputs, a Thunderbolt dock with HDMI out might be a solution, otherwise you'll have to stick with devices with two ports.

 

[priitv8]

DisplayPort device (monitor) must be at the end of the chain. Can't you plug your LaCie into Mac Mini and daisy-chain the mDP display off the HDD??

 

[thoang77]

Oh I didn't know the 2014 has 2 thunderbolts. Sorry about that confusion. The sad part is my girlfriend has a 2014 mac mini in the same room as me and I had no idea there was 2 thunderbolt ports.

DisplayPort device (monitor) must be at the end of the chain. Can't you plug your LaCie into Mac Mini and daisy-chain the mDP display off the HDD??

That's my setup at the moment. I have a LaCie Rugged Thunderbolt and was hoping I could use it via thunderbolt somehow rather than USB 3. I'm trying to spread the workload on the USB 3 bus, since I run a lot of external drives (photography backups a plenty).

Unfortunately you are correct. You can daisy chain Thunderbolt devices, but there are no splitters or hubs.

If your display has any other inputs, a Thunderbolt dock with HDMI out might be a solution, otherwise you'll have to stick with devices with two ports.

My display (NEC PA series) only has displayport and dual-link DVI, so I'd have to pay an arm and a leg for some kind of active adapter to convert HDMI to displayport or dual-link DVI and get the 2560x1440 resolution.

Thanks for the confirmation everyone