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Apple Releases Second Studio Display 16.4 Firmware Beta

After the first beta was released, it felt like the comment section was angry that Apple was updating firmware in a monitor. This is a much more accepting group!

I got my Studio Display a few months after launch and it's been the best monitor I've owned. The price seemed inline with everything else I buy from Apple. I have a very well lit office, and actually get compliments on how the web cam looks - your milage may vary LOL!
 
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I bought one the day it came out, it’s on 24/7. Not one problem….none. I don’t know why others have so many issues. I don’t see a problem with the price. There are few displays made this well IMO. Cheap displays are cheap. Made of plastic and sometimes have wobbly bases. Nothing wrong with a cheap display and there are lots of quality panels….it’s the plastic that sucks. This is just a nice clean setup. Apple displays are always expensive but last a long long time. Still have first gen Cinema Displays that works great.
 
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BellSystem said:
Apple displays are always expensive but last a long long time.
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They sure do. I have a cinema display from ~1999 still in daily use. And I knocked the poor thing onto a concrete floor a few years back.

I agree wholeheartedly with not having a problem with the price of the ASD. I make my living sitting in front of a computer and the three things I care most about are display, keyboard, and mouse as those are the pieces I actually interact with physically.
 
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mrr said:
Apple needs an affordable monitor.
Click to expand...
Depends what you mean. Try find a 5k monitor with a hub inbuilt (3 usb c, 1 thunderbolt), inbuilt studio quality mics, inbuilt webcam and the same quality for less. You won't find it. Not many 5k monitors about, the LG Ultrafine is one, but you'll need buy a webcam, studio mikes and speakers and use two sockets of your hub, which also makes it all less elegant and won't work with centre stage. The initial purchase price may be high, but it will hold its second hand value more than say LG or Samsung, so it is actually cheaper during total ownership (purchase price less 2nd hand value) than any other 5k monitor/usb c TB hub/cam/mic setup you can buy.
 
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TheYayAreaLiving 🎗 said:
Hard to believe but times have changed. We have MagSafe to USB-C adapter cable receiving a software update. All done without you knowing.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1625588206748983320
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Just in case, this is not a joke post right?
Also brings into even more perspective about Apple having MFi USBC cables for when the iPhone changes to USBC and a few years old news about USB cables/dongles being able to hack away at the computer it gets connected to (and by extension your Phone).

temende said:
I'm a very happy studio display owner, but I sometimes feel uneasy about it getting regular software updates on the iOS release cadence. Seems like more opportunity for things to get worse compared to just having built-in firmware that only gets upgraded for urgent bug fixes.
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100% agreed… seeing how for the last several years it seems like retesting basic features that used to work gets skipped, I can foresee the camera quality potentially degrading to the launch days once again, or some peripherals suddenly stopping to be detected when connected to it.

Anything basic really, macrumors is full of examples on this: “Update X or Y breaks device Bluetooth compatibility Z”, or “battery stops charging when connected to device A” or buttons on window “prompt B” missing, resizable windows not resizable anymore, Safari partied hard between updates and is all hungover now, etc

Crossing fingers

BellSystem said:
I bought one the day it came out, it’s on 24/7. Not one problem….none. I don’t know why others have so many issues. I don’t see a problem with the price. There are few displays made this well IMO. Cheap displays are cheap. Made of plastic and sometimes have wobbly bases. Nothing wrong with a cheap display and there are lots of quality panels….it’s the plastic that sucks. This is just a nice clean setup. Apple displays are always expensive but last a long long time. Still have first gen Cinema Displays that works great.
Click to expand...
Same here, I have had two TB Displays since they came out 10 years ago, now I got each paired with newer Studio Displays (+ a third cheap found at <$100 Samsung screen), each pair at two distinct places.
Can’t stress how neat, clean and wobble-less solid they all are. The old ones look as bright and color unshifted as new and the Studio Displays are the obvious super sharp upgrade to that.

The cheaper utility monitors always wobble just by staring too hard at it, have a separate power brick (which I taped under the desk to get them out of view), less sharp, a bit washed out image, etc. Sure it’s a cheap one, but I see a lot of the same even on 4K and 5K (less so here) plastic-y monitors.

The basic Thomas Sowell saying applies: “there are no solutions, just trade offs”. Or the broken tripod. Pick any of that.
Paying less for a screen, while very nice for the pocket, doesn’t come free of trade offs.
 
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I know I have an opinion that would probably differ quite a bit from a lot of people here:

I actually love the Displays Manufacturing, material and design qualities and I do not wanna miss them. There is nothing out there even being close to compare. Yes, there are tech specs and refresh rates and I wish the studio display would just be a little closer to those. But in terms of overall quality you can't compare it to anything else.

I do value those qualities a lot. I just can't stand those plastic screens and products in general anymore. There are more people than me - not too many yes, but I am afraid to tell you that apple is aiming at exactly those people that look for more than just tech specs. They do not have to meet same sales numbers like for example a dell or a Samsung.

the expense of manufacturing a aluminium part in that size is crazy and not everyone is capable of doing that.

Still I wish they would have used a better technology for the display that would allow better blacks and smaller borders around the display. And I know to polarise here, but I would happily take that display with improved tech specs and play $400 more.
 
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I have a 2020 27" iMac with a great display.
The 27" Studio display contains hardware and software to run the A13 chip.
Why could not Apple issue software that would allow me to use the iMac that I currently have as a display for the Mac Studio that I would like to buy?
 
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cmcbhi said:
I have a 2020 27" iMac with a great display.
The 27" Studio display contains hardware and software to run the A13 chip.
Why could not Apple issue software that would allow me to use the iMac that I currently have as a display for the Mac Studio that I would like to buy?
Click to expand...
They could, they just don't want to it seems.
I finally gave in and got an ASD to hook to my 14" MBP and replaced my 2019 27" i9 iMac as my main system. I had it hooked to a Dell 2720Q for a while and it was fine, but really missed the 5K.
 
lazyrighteye said:
Still adjusting to the reality that is monitor firmware updates.

I haven't had an Apple-banded external display since they were called Cinema Displays (pairs with my first self-funded Mac, a Graphite G4). To date, one of my better panels. Would love to see them offer something a regular person could acquire. 🤪
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Plenty of monitors get firmware updates. The ones that don’t are usually poorly supported. You just don’t read about them because no one really cares about a Dell firmware update.
 
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-BigMac- said:
Can anything in these firmware updates provide “visible” differences (colour, response rate etc), or is it usually just reliability fixes?
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Hardware compatibility with new Mac and iPad hardware is also a possibility.
 
BellSystem said:
I bought one the day it came out, it’s on 24/7. Not one problem….none. I don’t know why others have so many issues. I don’t see a problem with the price. There are few displays made this well IMO. Cheap displays are cheap. Made of plastic and sometimes have wobbly bases. Nothing wrong with a cheap display and there are lots of quality panels….it’s the plastic that sucks. This is just a nice clean setup. Apple displays are always expensive but last a long long time. Still have first gen Cinema Displays that works great.
Click to expand...
I mostly agree, but the extra $500 for the height-adjustable stand felt like a slap in the face. The stand/mount should have been interchangeable and either included or, say a $99 option. I also feel like the power cable should have been readily detachable (this is something I personally could really use), and we all know about the webcam. But it's hard to argue with the display quality or build quality, and the speakers also are pretty incredible.
 
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Any chance they removed a few layers of potato from the camera?

I am currently bypassing the internal camera and using one that actually projects a legible image in an environment where there is ambient lighting, not harshly lit like an office or Apple Store.
 
Sowelu said:
Any chance they removed a few layers of potato from the camera?

I am currently bypassing the internal camera and using one that actually projects a legible image in an environment where there is ambient lighting, not harshly lit like an office or Apple Store.
Click to expand...
That’s why I am holding out. For $1.5K, you shouldn’t have to worry about the webcam. Plain and simple.
 
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cmcbhi said:
I have a 2020 27" iMac with a great display.
The 27" Studio display contains hardware and software to run the A13 chip.
Why could not Apple issue software that would allow me to use the iMac that I currently have as a display for the Mac Studio that I would like to buy?
Click to expand...
azentropy said:
They could, they just don't want to it seems.
I finally gave in and got an ASD to hook to my 14" MBP and replaced my 2019 27" i9 iMac as my main system. I had it hooked to a Dell 2720Q for a while and it was fine, but really missed the 5K.
Click to expand...
They do, sort of: You can use AirPlay (free, comes with MacOS) to run a signal from an AS Mac to an iMac, thus allowing you to use the iMac as an external monitor. The problem is that it doesn't work well. AirPlay's bandwidth is too low, so you can't use the display at full resolution and frame rate without compression, so it won't look as good. Plus people have reported lag. So while it's OK to use this way as a secondary monitor, I expect you'd be very disappointed if you wanted to use it as a prime. There's an aftermarket alternative called Luna Display ($120), which may be better, but has the same issues.

The bottom line is that there's no software fix to allow the iMac to be used as a fully-functional external monitor. The only way to achieve that would be if Apple designed the iMacs with a TB input, which they did not. This is unfortunate, because it means iMacs that could have found new life as external monitors end up on the trash heap. So much for Apple being green.
 
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StudioMacs said:
Apple doesn’t sell hardware or software. They sell a tightly integrated ecosystem. If that bothers you, stick to commodity hardware.
Click to expand...
I see, so if I just don't like something apple does I should just get out of the ecosystem instead of being critical of the products I like? Maybe you should not make dumb comments like that and actually contribute to a conversation. It's a monitor. Unless they are going to add full on appletv support to it or something like that, it shouldn't need software updates.
 
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