I think Apple's goal is to never offer an Apple monitor if there's any possibility that you could use a 3rd party one. IPS monitors with good color quality are slim pickings these days, but they do exist, albeit not at a "pro" level. Start searching for "AdobeRGB" monitors and then check the panel specifications to make sure they don't rely on FRC for color depth. Ironically, there seem to be more options for 27" than 30/32".
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
iMac Pro Works With Apple's New Pro Display XDR, But Limited to 5K Resolution
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
The situation will resolve itself once Apple puts the Cascadelake Xeons in the iMac Pro and bumps the various controllers.
Which... hopefully... is soon, because I want to buy one.
Which... hopefully... is soon, because I want to buy one.
Such drama!
Seems you are not aware the iMac Pro was released before the Pro Display XDR.
Should I be just as steamed it also doesn't work with my 2017 MBP?
It should be coming now that Intel is finally shipping new W-2200 series Xeon CPUs and AMD is now shipping newer GPUs.
That's the job of the LG 5K Ultrafine monitor.
Intel did not ship Titan Ridge controllers until after the iMac Pro started shipping and Apple is not going to update the iMac Pro just for it's TB3 controller since the only thing Titan Ridge brings to the table over Alpine Ridge is DisplayPort 1.4 support (which the XDR display needs).
The mid-2019 15" MBP, the 16" MBP and the new Mac Pro all shipped after Titan Ridge was available so Apple was able to add it in. Same with the Blackmagic eGPUs, which is why they can also drive the XDR.
The iMac Pro now has new CPUs and GPUs available that make it worth updating so once it does, it will add Titan Ridge and will be able to drive the XDR.
The LG Ultrafine 5K uses the same panel.
I am thinking WWDC 2020 would be a likely launch annoucement.
Yes. Titan Ridge supports DisplayPort 1.4, which has enough bandwidth to drive the XDR over a single TB3 cable. Alpine Ridge supports DisplayPort 1.2, which cannot (it can drive up to a 5K display over a single TB3 cable).
Tim is in charge of Intel’s thunderbolt implementation that came out after the iMac Pro was released?
Obviously the Pro needs a refresh, but this is just a bad take.
The issue here is that Apple is still selling the iMac Pro for a premium over the normal 5K iMac, with this limitation. Customers are going to buy it thinking that it can do whatever the normal 5K iMac can do.
A customer ready to drop five-figures on an iMac Pro and XDR display is going to perform their due diligence before buying and will know that the current iMac Pro cannot drive that display.
And honestly, if they are looking at an XDR display, they are looking at a Mac Pro (or maybe a MacBook Pro). Not an iMac Pro.
iMac Pro can drive 2 extra 5k displays.
That mean if they support tile mode they can drive this display in 10bit full depth without any problem from two cables. Just like how I'm currently driving a 10bit 4k 144Hz display with two DP 1.4 connections.
Apple should support this 2 thunderbolt 3 input mode as many professional display currently doing to workaround port bandwidth issues.
I should not matter whether the eGPU enclosure utilizes Alpine Ridge or Titan Ridge, as the 6k DP 1.4 signal would come from the eGPU itself. The speed on Thunderbolt 3 is with four 8 GT/s PCIe lanes the same. With an eGPU you can drive any display the GPU supports, including 8k. I used a Vega FE eGPU on a TB2 Mac and added two 4k displays at full speed that otherwise would not be supported. The difference is whether you connect the monitors to the Mac or the eGPU. If you drive them by the Mac, you are limited by whatever ports you have on there. You also may drive more traffic over the TB link that impacts eGPU performance. If you drive them by the eGPU itself, then many apps will favor the eGPU automatically, which is also convenient. Even at TB2 speed, my two monitor 4k eGPU setup worked beautifully on old Mac. It felt like a new computer.
Last edited:
Good point. Still doesn't make much sense in the long-term though, as someone could be looking at getting an iMac Pro now with the intention of connecting a Pro Display (or other 6K display) later on.
Price always come down. I remember when the 30" Apple Cinema Display was $3300. Now they're worthless since you can get a 32" 4k monitor with an IPS panel and better specs for ~$1200. Even less if you forgo the IPS.
I think Apple has been out of the monitor game since the Thunderbolt Display. The competition was just offering better tech without all the bells and whistles. As a Mac Pro user with two of TBolts, those laptop chargers dangling off to the side were useless.
Between Dreamcolor and Ultrasharp in the midrange, and NEC and Eizo in the high end, there's not much room or profit left for Apple. I see the XDR as them pushing into some undiscovered territory.
I wouldn't say it's a limitation, more just tech marching on. When the iMac Pro was made there wasn't even a 6k monitor option. We only reached 8k about a year or so ago AFAIR, and that display's panel is awesome, but the case leaves much to be desired.
Unless I’m mistaken, isn’t the thunderbolt controller implemented in the CPU?Wouldn't a more sensible request entail asking Apple to update the iMP's TB3 controller? I mean, it's not like Apple would need to wait on Intel to do that. It's not like Apple would have to wait on Intel to do anything amirite?
I expect Apple's view is that the customers most likely to purchase an XDR display will also be purchasing a Mac Pro or a MacBook Pro 16", both of which can drive the display already.
DisplayPort 1.2 cannot support 6K resolution over a single TB3 cable (it maxes out at 5K @ 60Hz) whereas DisplayPort 1.4 can.
So you need a Titan Ridge TB3 controller as it support DP 1.4. Alpine Ridge only supports DP 1.2.
I think the next iMac Pro will be 32-inch and 6K like the new XDR display and the normal iMac will retain a 27" 5K display which would provide some nice differentiation between the two computers as well as giving Apple more room internally to put higher powered components that require larger heatsinks and fans in the Pro model.
I want to see the test with the display and the new 16” MBP. Apple says they are compatible, but I would love to know if there are any performance downgrades and if the pair works really well together, unlike the LG MBP combo which crashed everytime you inplugged the Mac.
Actually. what I want is an Apple display for the rest of us. Doesn’t have to be as cheap as the rest of the market, just make it great. So weird to have these beautiful Macs and then attaching them to a crappy Dell which you stare at their brand all day long. It’s amazing to walk through these companies with open floor plans, and you would think they are Dell or Samsung shops with the sea of displays, when the reality is everyone is using Macs.
Put out a $1299-1499 display. Lots will hate the price. It won’t matter. Apple will still sell a ton of them. Could be a high profit margin item too since it’s basically an LG display made to Apple’s standards.
Actually. what I want is an Apple display for the rest of us. Doesn’t have to be as cheap as the rest of the market, just make it great. So weird to have these beautiful Macs and then attaching them to a crappy Dell which you stare at their brand all day long. It’s amazing to walk through these companies with open floor plans, and you would think they are Dell or Samsung shops with the sea of displays, when the reality is everyone is using Macs.
Put out a $1299-1499 display. Lots will hate the price. It won’t matter. Apple will still sell a ton of them. Could be a high profit margin item too since it’s basically an LG display made to Apple’s standards.
Last edited:
Agreed, which is why I am sure the "2020" iMac Pro will use Titan Ridge. I expect all the Macs will move to it on their next refresh, even those with iGPUs (Mac Mini, MacBook Air, etc.).
I would expect the "2020" iMac Pro to look like the current model, just with new CPUs, new GPUs and Titan Ridge.
I believe the XDR panel is too expensive to put in an iMac Pro and I don't really see how you could "decontent" it enough to make it cheaper (you would not want to take away the things that make it desirable to video professionals).
The technology was available at the time the iMP was released. The Vega GPUs in it support DP 1.4. Apple simply needed to put a DP connection on the machine. Their continued instance on only running DP over TB/USB—in either alt mode or multiplexed—is what resulted in this.
It's upgradeable through external graphics. Sure the internal graphics are stuck where they were on day 1, but external does allow laptops and AIOs some options, which used to be not really possible, or difficult to find an external graphics solution. In the old days, there were Expresscard eGPUs but they were very bandwidth-limited, and old iMacs didn't even have Expresscard and most Macbook Pros didn't have Expresscard either.
I don't think they'll use the exact same spec as the XDR panel. I think it'll drop the nano texture option, it'll drop the HDR feature with illumination zones. They'll just use the 6K panel part with less layers and such. This is just what I think anyway.
Any Apple customer considering and willing to spend from $5K to $14K for an iMac Pro has a responsibility to look at the specs and determine if it will meet his/her needs.
If one chooses to stay ignorant not looking at the specs, but hoping and wishing it could drive any future display or peripheral that may come along in the future, is not acting responsibly.
If they used DP in the Mac it wouldn't matter because the XDR Display is Thunderbolt only and doesn't work with non-Thunderbolt hosts, so they would also have to redo the XDR display to move it away from Thunderbolt.
Intel has a manufacturing problem and thus, Apple has to wait for build up, before releasing an updated iMac Pro.
Same here, and it'd be something out of this world to see Apple change the iMac's design so extensively.
Although, they could get away with using the R&D from the XDR to build a more conventional AIO with the current panel from the 5k iMac Pro. They could add the iMac's iconic bludge in the back and leave some room for the internals.
Just dreaming.