DisplayLink Manager Now Supports External Display Rotation on M1 Macs

[MacRumors]

Synaptics today released a new beta version of DisplayLink Manager for macOS with long-awaited support for external display rotation on M1 Macs. A company representative said a final release is planned by late December provided that beta testing is successful.

DisplayLink adapters have proven popular with M1 models of the MacBook Air and 13-inch MacBook Pro, as they allow for multiple external displays to be connected, despite Apple's tech specs indicating that the notebooks only support one external display. DisplayLink Manager helps with setting up external displays via DisplayLink.

As seen in the above screenshot shared on Reddit, the new version of DisplayLink Manager allows for external displays connected to an M1 Mac with DisplayLink adapters or docks to be used in both landscape and portrait orientations.

DisplayLink Manager 1.6 beta is compatible with all macOS Monterey and macOS Big Sur versions and is free to download on the Synaptics website.

The new 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro models officially support up to two external displays with the M1 Pro chip, or up to four external displays with the M1 Max chip, without the use of DisplayLink adapters or other workarounds.

Article Link: DisplayLink Manager Now Supports External Display Rotation on M1 Macs

 

[AppleTO]

I hope these new drivers work better than DisplayLink used to years ago.

 

[TheYayAreaLiving 🎗️]

Brilliant! Glad they are working on it. Released just in time when the new macOS update is out.

 

[saudor]

I hope these new drivers work better than DisplayLink used to years ago.

yeah it's substantially smoother these days. The update during the mojave era was a big improvement where for basic tasks, it became super smooth

EDIT: should also add that these things are useful even for intel. Radeon dGPUs are dumb in the sense that as soon as you connect a different display to it, it never properly enters an idle state even without load. The memory clock and sometimes the core clock (depending on the differing resolutions, refresh rates, and scaling factor) gets stuck at higher/max and pumps a ton of heat.

Things like displaylink and sidecar (depending on the Mac) partially uses the iGPU/T2 for hardware acceleration so the dGPU doesn’t freak out and the system remains much cooler

 

[MauiPa]

I never used that, worth looking into, but FYI, I add a third display to my M1 MBP by using mirroring onto an appleTV. It can be set as a per mirror, or a separate display. Works great

 

[TrulsZK]

Much better than a previous versions a few months ago where DisplayLink crashed completely when trying to rotate the display. Had to do a complete reset of the display settings to fix this to the point being able to use Displaylink with the display non-rotated.

 

[Mick-Mac]

I remember trying my best to work with displaylink a few year back - it was never quite right and there was always something broken. I just gave up on it. Frankly, I'm kind of amazed it's still a thing.

 

[utazdevl]

OMG, this is HUGE for me. I have an M1 Mini with a 32 inch curves maine monitor. When I work, I also have to live in Slack, so I hooked up an AOC 16 inch 2nd monitor, but have been trying for months to rotate it 90 degrees (portrait) to get a better viewing space so I can put my Photoshop pallett's there. I had no idea this was a "known" issue and just assumed I had created a workspace that simply wasn't viable.

This might be the best news of my weekend.

 

[waqas]

I want to connect dual monitors on my M1. This is the only limitation of these machines that I have found so far. I have been wary of DisplayLink, but I should probably trust that it will be fine. Wasn't Apple supposed to officially also enable dual monitor support?

 

[urbanmacUser]

I remember trying my best to work with displaylink a few year back - it was never quite right and there was always something broken. I just gave up on it. Frankly, I'm kind of amazed it's still a thing.

Lots of large companies that have hot desks use DisplayLink docks as it proves a single cable solution on the desk for screens, Ethernet and power.

 

[federoni]

I want to connect dual monitors on my M1. This is the only limitation of these machines that I have found so far. I have been wary of DisplayLink, but I should probably trust that it will be fine. Wasn't Apple supposed to officially also enable dual monitor support?

No problems doing this with my M1 Mac mini! I connect one monitor via HDMi and the second one through USB-C

 

[urbanmacUser]

I want to connect dual monitors on my M1. This is the only limitation of these machines that I have found so far. I have been wary of DisplayLink, but I should probably trust that it will be fine. Wasn't Apple supposed to officially also enable dual monitor support?

Not on the M1 Air or 13” MBP that was always one external screen only due to the GPU….the GPU supports two screens the laptop screen and one external screen, same GPU in Mac Mini so two screens.

New M1 Pro and Max is laptop screen and the multiple external screens.

 

[urbanmacUser]

No problems doing this with my M1 Mac mini! I connect one monitor via HDMi and the second one through USB-C

Laptops support two screens, the laptop screen and external screen, so same as Mac Mini.

 

[colinsky]

I'm running an LG 5K Ultrafine and two Dell U2715 2560x1440s on my m1 Mini with DisplayLink. Eager to see if the DisplayLink Manager update resolves my wake-from-sleep problem--all the windows in all the monitors re-collect in the center monitor upon waking from sleep.

Sigh, nope, still all collected in the center monitor. If I restart, the windows stay in their proper places.

 

[teknikal90]

I just want True Tone and nightshift support

 

[mannyvel]

I'm running an LG 5K Ultrafine and two Dell U2715 2560x1440s on my m1 Mini with DisplayLink. Eager to see if the DisplayLink Manager update resolves my wake-from-sleep problem--all the windows in all the monitors re-collect in the center monitor upon waking from sleep.

Sigh, nope, still all collected in the center monitor. If I restart, the windows stay in their proper places.

It's strange that Apple's support for remembering window positioning has gone so far downhill.

Three options:

Display Maid - save and restore window layouts

A Mac OS X app for saving and restoring window layout in multiple monitor setups

funk-isoft.com

Cordless Dog: Stay

cordlessdog.com

GitHub - relikd/Memmon: A simple daemon that restores your window positions on external monitors.

A simple daemon that restores your window positions on external monitors. - relikd/Memmon

github.com

Not sure which is better. I only have 2 monitors that don't sleep, so the problem doesn't affect me right now.

 

[cicton]

I'm sure M2 will support multiple displays

 

[starkjs]

I remember trying my best to work with displaylink a few year back - it was never quite right and there was always something broken. I just gave up on it. Frankly, I'm kind of amazed it's still a thing.

Me too, I was trying to use 2x 4k displays, one portrait and one landscape and no matter what I did, I could never get the monitor in portrait mode to ever work and gave up on the software too, just used two USB-C connections direct to the monitors and just worked

Lots of large companies that have hot desks use DisplayLink docks as it proves a single cable solution on the desk for screens, Ethernet and power.

Yep, I am in that exact boat! Works fine for Windows, but on Mac, just not there yet.

I really hope this new version fixes the issue with display rotation, but I assume it will not, as in the past, the screen rotation was being done in software and thus the very slow refresh rates. Not sure how you fix that, unless the DisplayLink software can get the graphics card to do it in hardware.

 

[ValueArb]

Displaylink is hot garbage. I used a DisplayLink adapter to try to drive two Dell 27 inch displays from my M1 Air, but it could only drive the second monitor in a resolution no better than the Airs display.

Then it stopped working and I couldn’t care to try to fix it. Instead I’ve ordered a 16 MBP to just drive them directly.

 

[colinsky]

It's strange that Apple's support for remembering window positioning has gone so far downhill.

Three options:

Display Maid - save and restore window layouts

A Mac OS X app for saving and restoring window layout in multiple monitor setups

funk-isoft.com

Cordless Dog: Stay

cordlessdog.com

GitHub - relikd/Memmon: A simple daemon that restores your window positions on external monitors.

A simple daemon that restores your window positions on external monitors. - relikd/Memmon

github.com

Not sure which is better. I only have 2 monitors that don't sleep, so the problem doesn't affect me right now.

Thanks!

 

[waqas]

I just wish Apple allowed it to be possible to drive two external displays (albeit at lower resolution and/or frame rate) instead of just one display 6K resolution at 60 FPS. Sounds like something to give them feedback on. But I doubt they will ever change that or if it is even possible to enable that.

Displaylink is hot garbage. I used a DisplayLink adapter to try to drive two Dell 27 inch displays from my M1 Air, but it could only drive the second monitor in a resolution no better than the Airs display.

Then it stopped working and I couldn’t care to try to fix it. Instead I’ve ordered a 16 MBP to just drive them directly.

 

[Westside guy]

I remember trying my best to work with displaylink a few year back - it was never quite right and there was always something broken. I just gave up on it. Frankly, I'm kind of amazed it's still a thing.

Yeah, DisplayLink is kinda ghetto - but definitely better than nothing. When it works, it works pretty well... until it decides not to.

 

[joshwenke]

I use it regularly. Yes it has some quirks but overall it's nice to provide support for the extra monitors. Certainly has improved too.

 

[chrizel]

Bought a DisplayLink dock in August with one of the newer DisplayLink chips which support 4K/60. Using it at home with my 13” M1 work MBP and my personal M1 MBA to drive an LG 5k and a Dell monitor. Besides some rare situations when connecting the device where the screen won’t turn on (which can be fixed by reconnecting the cable) - I’m satisfied with DisplayLink. Can recommend. But do your research and buy one of the newer devices with the 4K/60 chip.

What I really like: the DisplayLink dock is connected to the LG 5k, so to the MacBooks I still have one single cable that provides power, all screens, networking, usb devices etc.

 

[svish]

Good for those who need and use it