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Apple has made zero indication you can simulate a multi-monitor setup with your Mac with Vision Pro
- Thread starter LiemTa
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They probably haven’t taken the time to figure out the right protocol for that yet. Maybe it would require multiple AirPlay streams/connections, and you’d have to define a protocol for that and develop the drivers on both sides. Wifi bandwidth shouldn’t be an issue. Processing bandwidth on the AVP might be an issue, but then again you can prioritize the screen the user is currently focusing on (eye tracking). But it’s likely quite complex to get it all to work seamlessly.
What's blocking you from creating designated areas in a single screen for apps that you wanted in different monitors?
The thing costs more than a used car. They have no excuse. They should’ve been able to figure this out.
No one wants to use a mobile app when they’re trying to do desktop-class work
100% for me too. I got a first gen iPad hoping to leave my laptop at home. But it’s hard to create content on an iPad without an external keyboard. And once you add that it’s the same weight as a laptop … and less functional. So I just use a laptop.
When was the last time you bought a used car???
I just went on FB marketplace to check and plenty are $3500 or less and made within the last 10-15 years so I mean...
But yeah as far as I can see all it can do is mirror your screen, not even be a second screen. Of course you can do other things in conjunction with this to free up space, but that is at the mercy of if developers make these apps on it and as far as I know Apple hasn't really said anything about how many windows can be open at the same time on the machine that I am aware of and all of their marketing materials seem to indicate a max of 3-4 windows at a time.
I don't have a link to it now, but I'm pretty sure I saw a screenshot or video where someone had opened a dozen or more windows in the VisionOS simulator. Just with a quick image search, I see an example from the simulator with 7 windows open.
I am curious: if Vision Pro can expand the Mac monitor, how will the viewing experience be if we look at the physical Mac monitor directly through the Vision Pro? Will it be as good as we look at the physical screen with naked eyes?
HobeSoundDarryl
macrumors G5
If you have to see all of those Mac apps at the same time (more than visible on one Mac screen), it's appearing that it won't show them. However, there's always the whole Mission Control/Spaces Mac functionality. Logically group the apps important to you in other spaces- exactly as people do now when dealing with as little as a single monitor- and then single swipe to other spaces to quickly get to other running Mac apps in the Vpro view.
The Mac will be doing the "heavy lifting" Mac app multitasking and Vpro would only have to show what's on the single, virtualized screen.
So as it appears right now:
- One Big Mac "mirroring" screen visible in Vpro. If you can then isolate apps that run sufficiently well for your purposes on iPad, you could put up to all of those all around that Mac screen. For example, maybe you have FCPX running on the Mac big window using the whole screen... but then have iOS Safari for research or sourcing stock art/video around it somewhere, Messages & Email for iOS also running around it for collaboration or just keeping up with contacts, iOS Notes or Pages showing the video outline & notes for the editor, etc. I've just rolled out 5 key "screens"/apps all on screen together that often work in support to some main app running on a Mac. That will work well in Vpro.
- Probably about any number of iPad/Vpro apps spread around within the view as you might want them.
- If you have a number of Mac-only apps and/or apps that simply work in some way BETTER running on Mac and you can't display them all satisfactorily on one Mac screen, you probably will need to lean on Mission Control/Spaces on that Mac to quickly hop Mac screen to screen within Vpro. That should readily work just as well as using a Mac running many apps on a single, big, physical screen at home/office.
Very simply: up to many Mac screens in Vpro would be either visually "asleep" (but processing with the horsepower of the Mac) or updating when bandwidth is available. For example, if at some point, user decides to just read an email, all of the bandwidth to update an active Mac screen could be parsed out to grab new screenshots of other Mac screens and update the view in Vpro. Maybe that's 1fps, maybe 2, maybe 5- whatever is possible. User is not able to look at and process all of them at the same time anyway, so only whatever it currently holding their eyes gets the bulk of the local or Mac screen update processing.
If I'm Apple and I haven't made it that way already, I'm working on it. And if I haven't thought of it yet and read it in a thread like this one, it becomes an important productivity feature update "to do" for a future version of visionOS. I can't imagine any way that it can't be done... if Apple is just willing to put the code in place to support showing Mac "Spaces" as individual rectangles in a Vpro view.
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Found some of these online that might add to this discussion:
9to5mac.com
kguttag.com
Mac Virtual Display is limited in Vision Pro – but there's a plan B
Apple briefly touched on using Vision Pro as a Mac Virtual Display, which could be a first step toward a...
9to5mac.com
Apple Vision Pro (Part 5A) – Why Monitor Replacement is Ridiculous
Introduction As I wrote in Apple Vision Pro (Part 1) regarding the media coverage of the Apple Vision Pro, “Unfortunately, I saw very little technical analysis and very few with deep knowledge of t…
kguttag.com
how would you interact with the VP apps spread around? What if you have notes or mail as a VP app and you wanted to type an email on the VP mail app, would the MacBook keyboard work? If you are using Mac mirroring with VP apps and the Mac keyboard / trackpad can’t be used with the VP apps, this doesnt work.
HobeSoundDarryl
macrumors G5
Nobody outside of Apple knows yet. Conceptually, since Vpro knows where our eyes are looking and thus which app on which we are focused, perhaps one COULD use a Mac keyboard to type on a Vpro or iPad (on Vpro) app.
If Apple knows people are going to use Vpro as a Big Mac screen in some situations and also going to have Vpro apps around it, it's not a great leap to put in some new software to let the available keyboard and trackpad be "shared" with the apps user is focused on using at the moment.
If you use an iPad as a second screen with a Mac, can you use a trackpad or mouse and keyboard associated with a Mac on the iPad screen? Yes you can. Perhaps that gives us a peek at how this may work too? Or maybe it won't work and Apple has created a situation where user needs 2 keyboards and 2 trackpads to use a mixed grouping of apps? I have to think Apple would likely have thought of this very situation and implemented the better of those two. TBD... soon!
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I should hope Apple has thought of it. Currently we can extend our MacBook desktop to an iPad to use as a second display. I dont know what the technical differences are, but why couldn’t VP be used as an extended display, or multiple extended displays. Frankly, if any of this was possible right now, I think Apple would have highlighted it. Currently, they only show mirroring and only for a brief time, which doesnt give me confidence it works well.
If mirroring does work well, its a nice feature for working on a plane and hotel room, but Im not sure its better than MacBook+ipad extended display.
Well, I realized that I sort of misunderstood OP's point. Initially, I thought OP was discussing not being able to extend the display from the Mac screen. (OP was actually discussing having multiple virtual Mac screens on Vision Pro, but the demos only show one 4K screen.)
Yes, I did notice that the screen turns off in all demos, so I assumed that's how it works. But I'm still curious how the experience will be if it doesn't turn off and we can extend the desktop. Will the text on the physical Mac be more blurry? I guess it depends on the PPI of the Vision Pro.
But I'll sort of figure it out. I'm imagining this scenario that actually exists - when I need to use my iPhone, but I don't want to take my Vision Pro off, I need to look at my iPhone through the Vision Pro screen.
HobeSoundDarryl
macrumors G5
If I was Apple, I’d be dripping out interesting features this week, send out invitations for a new event on MON or TUE and have the event next week, just ahead of when it’s possible to buy one and actually take it home.
There’s 7 months of third party dev to show off, along with Apples own apps. Seems another event- a launch event- would make great sense. But we’ll see… or not.
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I doubt this will be seamless. Using a Mac and trying to multitask with other vp windows (using a kb for those) may require a separate bt kb.
If this was well thought out or worked great Apple would’ve shown it off. I’m not expecting the iPad apps that can be installed to work great either. These are optimized on a touchscreen iPad. Good luck using finger pinches and eye tracking to use iPad apps.
There’s going to be a lot of disappointment imo. And a big lack of vr content and native apps. Watching movies will quickly get old.
Expecting anything more than ipad apps running in 3d until it has been out for a while for software to be developed will end in disappointment.