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Apple Studio Display - Owners Thread

I picked one up today. I have to say I'm more impressed than I thought I'd be.

The image quality seems "cleaner", for lack of a better word, than the display in my 2015 iMac was. Also even though it's not an HDR display, HDR content looks SO MUCH NICER than on the 2015 iMac. Apple definitely did some trick to make it look HDR-ish, though I can tell it's not "real" HDR as soon as I drag the video over to the Macbook's XDR display.

The fans are silent as several here have said and it runs cool. That one I saw at Best Buy must have had issues; I hope mine doesn't develop that issue!

My next step is finding a way to keep my window arrangements in check. When I switch from using the Studio Display to the laptop by itself, the windows are now all the wrong size and I have to rearrange them. When I switch back, again, gotta rearrange everything. It gets tiring doing this twice a workday as I head to the office.

But oh damn, this display. It was totally worth it and my doubts have been squashed.
 
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zorinlynx said:
The image quality seems "cleaner", for lack of a better word, than the display in my 2015 iMac was.
Click to expand...

The (glossy in my case) ASD may have an even better anti-glare coating than my 2017 iMac 5k did and it certainly has higher maximum brightness, so in normal use in a well-lit room contrast is really excellent and the LCD black level isn't very apparent (if at all) and reflections are minimal and not a problem. It's actually better than the matte 4k LG display next to the ASD.

Only in a dimmed room the black level is more visible but then I run it at reduced brightness anyway and the great thing is that it is fully consistent without any blooming artefacts mini LED displays have.

I personally value consistency more than maximum black levels at the cost of blooming artefacts (or OLED burn in), so the ASD is the best compromise for me at this time.

zorinlynx said:
My next step is finding a way to keep my window arrangements in check.
Click to expand...

That is a weakness of macOS, especially since the 12.5 Update because it now keeps ejecting windows from my extra 4k screen after each display sleep/wakeup which is even more annoying (minimizing those windows before display sleep "saves" their positions for later, but this sucks!).

Otherwise I'm using some hot key Apple Scripts and the Moom utility to relatively quickly get windows back to their desired positions which is not perfect but usable.
 
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zorinlynx said:
My next step is finding a way to keep my window arrangements in check. When I switch from using the Studio Display to the laptop by itself, the windows are now all the wrong size and I have to rearrange them. When I switch back, again, gotta rearrange everything. It gets tiring doing this twice a workday as I head to the office.
Click to expand...
Mac apps Stay and Display Maid will do what you are looking for. Display Maid is faster but Stay is more stable and reliable.
 
Keep seeing reports and videos that USB and sound suddenly fails and everything needs a reboot. MBP and Mac Studio owners both same experience with this display.

FFS test the MF thing before shipping it.
 
zorinlynx said:
I picked one up today. I have to say I'm more impressed than I thought I'd be.

The image quality seems "cleaner", for lack of a better word, than the display in my 2015 iMac was. Also even though it's not an HDR display, HDR content looks SO MUCH NICER than on the 2015 iMac. Apple definitely did some trick to make it look HDR-ish, though I can tell it's not "real" HDR as soon as I drag the video over to the Macbook's XDR display.

The fans are silent as several here have said and it runs cool. That one I saw at Best Buy must have had issues; I hope mine doesn't develop that issue!

My next step is finding a way to keep my window arrangements in check. When I switch from using the Studio Display to the laptop by itself, the windows are now all the wrong size and I have to rearrange them. When I switch back, again, gotta rearrange everything. It gets tiring doing this twice a workday as I head to the office.

But oh damn, this display. It was totally worth it and my doubts have been squashed.
Click to expand...
Not sure if it helps when switching between display and laptop, as I’m connected to a Mac Mini, but there’s a free app called Rectangle for resizing windows by snapping them to a layout (like in Windows) that is amazing. Much better than the native macOS tiling imo and might make it faster.
 
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constructor said:
I had been using an iMac 5k before so I knew what I'd be getting, but as a developer I love the 5k resolution for perfectly sharp and readable text, even in small notes or Terminal logs. I'd never willingly go back to something worse!
Click to expand...
@constructor I was curious with the text being sharp and readable did you have the ASD further back or was it at the same distance as your previous (monitors) from your seating position ?
 
justmadeupname said:
@constructor I was curious with the text being sharp and readable did you have the ASD further back or was it at the same distance as your previous (monitors) from your seating position ?
Click to expand...
I was quite happy with the distance for the iMac 5k, so I've set up the ASDs angled at the same viewing distance of about 75cm / 30".

On the 27" 5k displays this does indeed make the pixels disappear practically completely (solid-colour areas appear completely smooth, too) and text being practically perfectly sharp, while the 4k display next to them is still noticeably grainy in white backgrounds and text is noticeably fuzzier and softer.

So at least to my eyes Apple has chosen the "Retina" resolution exactly right for my desktop usage, but it will likely vary with individual sight.
 
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constructor said:
I was quite happy with the distance for the iMac 5k, so I've set up the ASDs angled at the same viewing distance of about 75cm / 30".

On the 27" 5k displays this does indeed make the pixels disappear practically completely (solid-colour areas appear completely smooth, too) and text being practically perfectly sharp, while the 4k display next to them is still noticeably grainy in white backgrounds and text is noticeably fuzzier and softer.

So at least to my eyes Apple has chosen the "Retina" resolution exactly right for my desktop usage, but it will likely vary with individual sight.
Click to expand...
Yeah, I tried a 4K display, I really did. It just didn't measure up, and never looked quite "right" to me in comparison to my 5K iMac.

I do love the Dell display I got, and ended up putting it on my Windows box, where it looks great, but my standards for a Windows machine just aren't as exacting as my standards for a Mac. The fact that the Dell was half the price of the Studio Display just shows that you get what you pay for.
 
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zorinlynx said:
Yeah, I tried a 4K display, I really did. It just didn't measure up, and never looked quite "right" to me in comparison to my 5K iMac.

I do love the Dell display I got, and ended up putting it on my Windows box, where it looks great, but my standards for a Windows machine just aren't as exacting as my standards for a Mac. The fact that the Dell was half the price of the Studio Display just shows that you get what you pay for.
Click to expand...
@zorinlynx I'm curious what was the make/model of the 4K screen?
 
zorinlynx said:
Yeah, I tried a 4K display, I really did. It just didn't measure up, and never looked quite "right" to me in comparison to my 5K iMac.

I do love the Dell display I got, and ended up putting it on my Windows box, where it looks great, but my standards for a Windows machine just aren't as exacting as my standards for a Mac. The fact that the Dell was half the price of the Studio Display just shows that you get what you pay for.
Click to expand...
Yes, I couldn't quite bring myself to spring for a third ASD for the extra screen which I'm running vertically basically as a kind of extra dashboard, so I got a reasonably priced LG 27UP850-W (at about a quarter of the price of an ASD) which has the same P3 colour space and at 400nits at least approximately comparable brightness, but the difference in resolution is quite noticeable, both in scaled (from 5k) or in native mode.

So relative to the price and relative to not being used for primary document / source code editing it's quite okay, but I wouldn't want to actually work on it all the time.
 
Moving soon so the place is in a bit of disarray but here's my new desk set up:
IMG_0204.JPG
 
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zorinlynx said:
My next step is finding a way to keep my window arrangements in check. When I switch from using the Studio Display to the laptop by itself, the windows are now all the wrong size and I have to rearrange them.
Click to expand...
As someone else mentioned, the application "Stay" is your friend. Works great.
 
MacRail said:
As someone else mentioned, the application "Stay" is your friend. Works great.
Click to expand...
Huh, that's hilarious. I went to check it out, and it showed the little cloud icon, which means I'd bought it before! It's funny because I don't even remember buying it in the past. But I fired it up, stored window positions, and it seems to work! So thanks for the recommendation for software I apparently already bought and didn't remember. :)
 
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ponzicoinbro said:
Keep seeing reports and videos that USB and sound suddenly fails and everything needs a reboot. MBP and Mac Studio owners both same experience with this display.

FFS test the MF thing before shipping it.
Click to expand...
I think sound issues are inflated.

I have 2 ASD and I use with Mac Studio/M1 MacBook Pro from launch date. Zero issues with Sound So Far.
 
Update: software update indeed fixed the issue.

I am actually having an issue I just discovered with my second display. the camera angles are not consistent. the second one I just purchased, has a really high camera shot. the bottom of my chin is cut off on zoom. I have center stage turned off to be clear. the two displays are at the exact same angle, but one is significantly higher. I checked the firmware on both and the new one with the problem is actually newer firmware. I'm updating and restarting now, but this doesn't seem like a software problem.
 
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jacklivehere said:
I think sound issues are inflated.

I have 2 ASD and I use with Mac Studio/M1 MacBook Pro from launch date. Zero issues with Sound So Far.
Click to expand...

I have seen it in person, tested it in two stores, and there is a whole thread about it here and other sites…..


If you use the USB ports on the monitor as a hub the sound and the usb ports will fail at random moments And the computer and monitor have to be rebooted.

Anyone who says this isn’t “inflated” or “exaggerated” is not testing properly, not using all the ports or being ignorant.

You have to see what many users are facing not just one or two people who say “But I have no problem’.
 
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anthony13 said:
Update: software update indeed fixed the issue.

I am actually having an issue I just discovered with my second display. the camera angles are not consistent. the second one I just purchased, has a really high camera shot. the bottom of my chin is cut off on zoom. I have center stage turned off to be clear. the two displays are at the exact same angle, but one is significantly higher. I checked the firmware on both and the new one with the problem is actually newer firmware. I'm updating and restarting now, but this doesn't seem like a software problem.
Click to expand...
As a new ASD owner that hasn't had the issue yet, I'm glad the update fixes it!

I have EVERYTHING hanging off the ASD. It's so cool to put my Macbook on the stand, plug in ONE cable, and everything comes up. If this continues working reliably I may never own a desktop Mac again.

Plugged into the ASD are:

- USB-C to TOSlink audio output adapter
- USB3 hub, which has a 2.5G ethernet adapter and an external hard drive dock plugged into it
- USB2 hub, which has my mouse and a USB to PS2 adapter with an IBM Model M keyboard on it

Everything is neatly cable managed behind and it looks great.
 
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trevor-b said:
One more:

Occasionally, the picture will auto refresh soon after I join via Google Meet and the resulting image is much better than the initial one. Any idea why this happens? It doesn't happen all the time.
Click to expand...
Any ideas? Happens more when I'm wearing a dark shirt, fwiw
 
zorinlynx said:
My next step is finding a way to keep my window arrangements in check. When I switch from using the Studio Display to the laptop by itself, the windows are now all the wrong size and I have to rearrange them. When I switch back, again, gotta rearrange everything. It gets tiring doing this twice a workday as I head to the office.
Click to expand...

Check out Moom by manytricks.com
 
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