Apple Cinema Display HD 23-inch (DVI) Power?

[flyrod]

There's an Apple Cinema Display HD 23-inch (DVI) on craiglist but without the power brick. I've never owned one of these. Can someone tell me if the 90W Power Brick is special? Is this the same brick or at least the same connector as the G4 mac mini? I have an extra one of those... Thanks.

 

[eyoungren]

You need the brick as that is actually the PSU for this thing.

 

[flyrod]

Is it the same brick as anything else? Like the brick for a powerbook will power an ibook. From the pictures I can find, it looks the same as the 18.5v brick for a mac mini.

 

[eyoungren]

Is it the same brick as anything else? Like the brick for a powerbook will power an ibook. From the pictures I can find, it looks the same as the 18.5v brick for a mac mini.

That, I can't answer as the only aluminum display I've every worked with is here at work and I don't own any other Mac with a similar style adapter.

 

[bunnspecial]

I have one down in my car that I need to unwrap...I'll show a photo when I get it out later this evening.

BTW, as an interesting point, the acrylic 23" is rated at 75W and the aluminum at 90W. I was under the impression that these two displays used the same panel, so I wonder if the difference is in the backlight...

 

[bunnspecial]

FYI-the power connector on my 23"

It does sort-of kind-of look like the female version of the connector on my late '06 Mini, but I have a very strong suspicion that it's not actually that. The two are in different physical locations at the moment, so I can't compare them.

 

[A.Goldberg]

I have one down in my car that I need to unwrap...I'll show a photo when I get it out later this evening.

BTW, as an interesting point, the acrylic 23" is rated at 75W and the aluminum at 90W. I was under the impression that these two displays used the same panel, so I wonder if the difference is in the backlight...

Just a hypothesis here, but as I'm sure you realize the aluminum displays have 2 firewire ports + USB, while the acrylic monitors only have USB. Perhaps the extra power is used for supporting the FW Ports. Then again, the power could come from the mac... I have no idea. Perhaps you do. The backlights do seem brighter in the aluminum displays though.

 

[bunnspecial]

Just a hypothesis here, but as I'm sure you realize the aluminum displays have 2 firewire ports + USB, while the acrylic monitors only have USB. Perhaps the extra power is used for supporting the FW Ports. Then again, the power could come from the mac... I have no idea. Perhaps you do. The backlights do seem brighter in the aluminum displays though.

The Firewire idea is an interesting one. A FW bus is supposed to supply 45W, although I don't know if it's per bus or per port. In any case, a Firewire "hub" is a bit unusual, as daisy chaining is the normal way to connect multiple devices. With that said, my rackmount G4 does have a 4 port FW400 hub in the front of it.

If it's designed to supply 45W through each FW port, that would account for a whole lot of extra power...

I've never used one of the Al displays, so can't comment on the brightness. Interestingly, in my reading, I've seen many comments that reference them "failing" due to increased current draw of the aging backlight that's more than the 90W PSU can supply.

90W at 24V is 3.75A. It wouldn't be terribly difficult to built a 24V PSU that can supply 5A or so...perhaps a project for one of these days.

 

[A.Goldberg]

The Firewire idea is an interesting one. A FW bus is supposed to supply 45W, although I don't know if it's per bus or per port. In any case, a Firewire "hub" is a bit unusual, as daisy chaining is the normal way to connect multiple devices. With that said, my rackmount G4 does have a 4 port FW400 hub in the front of it.

If it's designed to supply 45W through each FW port, that would account for a whole lot of extra power...

I've never used one of the Al displays, so can't comment on the brightness. Interestingly, in my reading, I've seen many comments that reference them "failing" due to increased current draw of the aging backlight that's more than the 90W PSU can supply.

90W at 24V is 3.75A. It wouldn't be terribly difficult to built a 24V PSU that can supply 5A or so...perhaps a project for one of these days.

Yeah, I wasn't sure if the extra few watts gave the FW an extra boost, but thats out of my field of knowledge. I'm quite surprised you haven't picked up an Al ACD yet!

 

[bunnspecial]

Yeah, I wasn't sure if the extra few watts gave the FW an extra boost, but thats out of my field of knowledge. I'm quite surprised you haven't picked up an Al ACD yet!

I have one that I've been staring at for a few days. It's supposedly dead and is missing the PSU.

The person who sold me my Quad threw it in for the cost of shipping.

Even so, I'm taking it to work tomorrow and going to see if I can jerry-rig a PSU. I'm sure I can find a 24V DC PSU around somewhere.

For a good part of tomorrow, I'm going to be sitting in the stockroom waiting on the UPS guy(and getting paid to do it!), but I think I can nip across the hall to our scientific instrument tech's store room and see if he can come up with anything.

 

[RedCroissant]

There's an Apple Cinema Display HD 23-inch (DVI) on craiglist but without the power brick. I've never owned one of these. Can someone tell me if the 90W Power Brick is special? Is this the same brick or at least the same connector as the G4 mac mini? I have an extra one of those... Thanks.

Don't buy it because the PSU for the Mac mini or any other Apple device will not power that display and you will have wasted your money. Also, the PSUs for the 20-inch ACD (at least the earlier revisions of the display) were kind of faulty and usually resulted in owners buying the 90 watt PSUS for the 23-inch to power their 20s.

My advice would be to find a a PowerMac sale on Craigslist that has the display included because they generally include the PSU and that would be a much better option.

And yes, the PSU has to be 90w because not only is it powering the display itself, it has to provide power for the FW/USB hub that is in the display in order to get the most out of those ports, otherwise each port would be degraded due to it's being powered off of one FW 400 port and would relegate those two ports to less than usb 2.0 speeds.

 

[A.Goldberg]

I've seen 20" and 23" aluminum ACD's advertised for pretty cheap- under $100 for the 20". I got a 23" for $80 in perfect condition actually.

I have 2x23" right now. One is hooked up to my Mac Pro, the other is in my office at work (the 20" LCD wasn't cutting it).

 

[lucasfer899]

Surprised no one's put it plainly yet, the power connectors in question look very similar, however on the Mini the connector is attached to the power brick, and plugs into the back of the Mini. On the other hand, the power connector on the Al ACD is attached to the ACD, and goes into the power brick.

Despite looking similar (no idea if they're identical) they are completely different implementations.

Mini's Power brick / cord with plug attached:

ACD

Where it all ends up, a Y cable comes out of the back of the ACD and splits 4 ways.
Power, Firewire, USB, and DVI.