I bought a brand new Macbook Pro about 3 months ago. Having fallen in love with it, I've been wanting to get an external monitor to use with it. I finally decided on a Samsung T260HD TV, which I finally purchased and had delivered the other day.
I buy one of the Apple MB570 - Minidisplayport to DVI - adapters and begin to hook everything up. Pretty straight forward, using the DVI cable that came with the Samsung TV / Monitor, plugged it into the MacBook, powered everything up, but no picture ever displayed on the Samsung. MB came up as normal, but did not detect or recognize the Samsung.
I immediately started trolling message boards figuring I was missing something very obvious, but searches only yielded posts discussing external monitor use with the MB lid closed, not one simply not working at all.
Next step I call Apple Support. The guy on the phone walks me through a series of troubleshooting steps on the MB, including -
1.) Pressing the CMD F1 then CMD F2 keys,
2.) Holding the P+R+CMD+Option keys for 2 reboot cycles,
3.) scaling down the resolution of the MB (we went as far down as 800x600),
4.) And even plugging the monitor into a different power outlet (to ensure enough power was getting to it)
I should stop now to mention that I had indeed tested the Samsung out simply using my Window Media PC which has dual DVI's out via an NVIDIA GeForce 9600 GSO video card. Monitor lit right up, no problems. Plugged it back into the MB570 adapter which was plugged into my MB, again, monitor goes to sleep like there is no signal, and MB still sees no additional display.
In the end, none of those steps we went through worked, no joy. Apple Support suggested it was either my MB, or the adapter I had just bought after I told them that the Sammy worked just fine with the Windows box.
Not sure why it only occurred to me after I hung up the phone, but my girlfriend has the same model MB I do (purchased only a few months prior to mine). So naturally I figured I'd test the adapter / monitor with her MB. Still no display.
Convinced it was going to be a faulty adapter (who'd have thought right?), I stop by the local Mac store on the way home, where I bought the adapter from, and was going to ask them to test it out, and even brought my MB along in case by some zany twist of fate the adapter appeared to work.
Sure enough, I surrender my MB and the adapter to them, they take it in the back, and within about 1 minute, invite me back to take a look..... it was displaying on one of their 2-3 year old 15" LCD monitors (didn't get the brand, sorry) with absolutely no issue. The guy says "I just plugged it in and it came right up."
I stare at him dumbfounded, feeling like a real idiot, thank him for his time, and leave as confused as ever. On the way home I wonder if it's the DVI cable that is the culprit (even though I am using the same DVI cable from the Windows PC to the Samsung, and it works flawlessly. I still convince myself a different DVI cable was the next logical step. As luck would have it, my Windows PC has been connected to my household primary TV, a 50" Samsung DLP, for the last 2+ years, you guessed it, via DVI...
Even with the other DVI cable, still no joy between the MB and the Samsung.
Any help thoughts / advice would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks!
***Update - with some good advice, I tried the dual-link mini-display to DVI adapter, (Apple retail $99), still no joy, however, while the MB still does not seem to "see" the display, I can open up the lid, and it clearly powers itself on, but the MB screen stays black, which says to me that it thinks it's porting the display out somewhere, but it's just not getting to the monitor.
After trying the above, I also tried a mini-display to VGA adapter (Apple retail $29), and lo and behold, I get a picture. Albeit it's a washed out, and significantly less crisp analog picture, but I get one.
So while some might say "problem solved" at this point, I'd really like to see what folks might say about this seeming lack of DVI hookup capability. (Note, with some further good suggestions from friends, I'm going to try going DVI to HDMI into the TV / monitor, still using the dual-link mini display to DVI adapter.
**** 06-29-09 Update - Single Link Mini display port to DVI adapter + DVI to HDMI cable + Samsung HDMI input = JOY
Thanks to a couple of my buddies for figuring this one out.
I buy one of the Apple MB570 - Minidisplayport to DVI - adapters and begin to hook everything up. Pretty straight forward, using the DVI cable that came with the Samsung TV / Monitor, plugged it into the MacBook, powered everything up, but no picture ever displayed on the Samsung. MB came up as normal, but did not detect or recognize the Samsung.
I immediately started trolling message boards figuring I was missing something very obvious, but searches only yielded posts discussing external monitor use with the MB lid closed, not one simply not working at all.
Next step I call Apple Support. The guy on the phone walks me through a series of troubleshooting steps on the MB, including -
1.) Pressing the CMD F1 then CMD F2 keys,
2.) Holding the P+R+CMD+Option keys for 2 reboot cycles,
3.) scaling down the resolution of the MB (we went as far down as 800x600),
4.) And even plugging the monitor into a different power outlet (to ensure enough power was getting to it)
I should stop now to mention that I had indeed tested the Samsung out simply using my Window Media PC which has dual DVI's out via an NVIDIA GeForce 9600 GSO video card. Monitor lit right up, no problems. Plugged it back into the MB570 adapter which was plugged into my MB, again, monitor goes to sleep like there is no signal, and MB still sees no additional display.
In the end, none of those steps we went through worked, no joy. Apple Support suggested it was either my MB, or the adapter I had just bought after I told them that the Sammy worked just fine with the Windows box.
Not sure why it only occurred to me after I hung up the phone, but my girlfriend has the same model MB I do (purchased only a few months prior to mine). So naturally I figured I'd test the adapter / monitor with her MB. Still no display.
Convinced it was going to be a faulty adapter (who'd have thought right?), I stop by the local Mac store on the way home, where I bought the adapter from, and was going to ask them to test it out, and even brought my MB along in case by some zany twist of fate the adapter appeared to work.
Sure enough, I surrender my MB and the adapter to them, they take it in the back, and within about 1 minute, invite me back to take a look..... it was displaying on one of their 2-3 year old 15" LCD monitors (didn't get the brand, sorry) with absolutely no issue. The guy says "I just plugged it in and it came right up."
I stare at him dumbfounded, feeling like a real idiot, thank him for his time, and leave as confused as ever. On the way home I wonder if it's the DVI cable that is the culprit (even though I am using the same DVI cable from the Windows PC to the Samsung, and it works flawlessly. I still convince myself a different DVI cable was the next logical step. As luck would have it, my Windows PC has been connected to my household primary TV, a 50" Samsung DLP, for the last 2+ years, you guessed it, via DVI...
Even with the other DVI cable, still no joy between the MB and the Samsung.
Any help thoughts / advice would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks!
***Update - with some good advice, I tried the dual-link mini-display to DVI adapter, (Apple retail $99), still no joy, however, while the MB still does not seem to "see" the display, I can open up the lid, and it clearly powers itself on, but the MB screen stays black, which says to me that it thinks it's porting the display out somewhere, but it's just not getting to the monitor.
After trying the above, I also tried a mini-display to VGA adapter (Apple retail $29), and lo and behold, I get a picture. Albeit it's a washed out, and significantly less crisp analog picture, but I get one.
So while some might say "problem solved" at this point, I'd really like to see what folks might say about this seeming lack of DVI hookup capability. (Note, with some further good suggestions from friends, I'm going to try going DVI to HDMI into the TV / monitor, still using the dual-link mini display to DVI adapter.
**** 06-29-09 Update - Single Link Mini display port to DVI adapter + DVI to HDMI cable + Samsung HDMI input = JOY
Thanks to a couple of my buddies for figuring this one out.