On 30" Cinema Display, 2014 Mac mini boots with oversized Apple icon and progress bar

[EugW]

My 2007 Mac Pro is out of commission, so I replaced it with a 2014 Mac mini with PCIe SSD. I have the 30-inch Apple Cinema HD Display with Apple mini-DisplayPort to dual-link DVI adapter, plugged into the Thunderbolt port of the Mac mini. OS is Monterey.

Everything works fine, except there is this minor glitch at bootup. It begins the bootup process with an oversized Apple symbol and an oversized progress bar, as if this 2560x1600 monitor is being recognized at 1280x800. Then part way through the boot it changes to a normal sized Apple symbol and progress bar, with a proper 2560x1600 resolution.

I know this is a minor thing, but is there a way to fix this? It's as if it recognizes it only as single-link at first, and then realizes after drivers are loaded that it is dual-link and adjusts accordingly. I didn't have this issue with the Mac Pro, but it was running 10.11 El Capitan with a Radeon 5770 with native dual-link DVI output. (No adapter required.)

 

[joevt]

Do you have any other display with a higher or similar resolution that the 2014 supports before macOS boots?

Does the issue exist for the macOS versions that the 2014 Mac mini supports? I understand they all use the same EFI environment but I am wondering if there's a nvram setting that the older macOS versions might set.

I suppose you could start by finding out if your EFI environment can use the higher res mode. Try RefindPlus or OpenCore etc. See if they report the higher res mode in their logs and can use that mode.

 

[Fishrrman]

"I replaced it with a 2014 Mac mini with PCIe SSD. I have the 30-inch Apple Cinema HD Display with Apple mini-DisplayPort to dual-link DVI adapter, plugged into the Thunderbolt port of the Mac mini. OS is Monterey."

I'll reckon the adapter and connection scheme (dual link) has something to do with it.

Your idea of what's going awry at boot is logical, as Mr. Spock would say.
Sounds like the Mini "is missing something" at bootup -- perhaps exactly what resolution you want -- and so it's outputting some kind of "default" resolution in its place -- until a little later during the boot process, when the Mini discovers "the correct resolution" and thus "resets" the display to conform to it.

I'm gonna guess... that there really isn't anything you can do about this.

Something I heard someone say more than 40 years ago in the Army:
"Don't sweat the small stuff".

 

[EugW]

Do you have any other display with a higher or similar resolution that the 2014 supports before macOS boots?

I just tested this with the Mac mini plugged into a 2010 2560x1440 iMac in target display mode. This shows the proper resolution and proper Apple symbol and progress bar sizes. However, it's plugged in directly via a mini-DisplayPort cable. No dual-link DVI adapter involved.

Does the issue exist for the macOS versions that the 2014 Mac mini supports? I understand they all use the same EFI environment but I am wondering if there's a nvram setting that the older macOS versions might set.

This I cannot say because that Mac mini no longer has any other OS on it, and I was too lazy to pull out my old boot drives for this.

I can say though that booting into the startup manager when using the dual-link DVI adapter gives me oversized boot drive icons. Also, if I boot into recovery mode, it starts out as above with the big Apple symbol and progress bar, but then eventually switches to the proper resolution, so that the recovery OS looks normal.

Oh well, I think I'll just do what @Fishrrman suggests, and will just ignore it. ?

Something I heard someone say more than 40 years ago in the Army:
"Don't sweat the small stuff".

OTOH, I'm happy that Monterey can still control the brightness of this 30" Cinema HD Display via keyboard function keys. I also just picked up a 23" Cinema HD Display today, and Monterey controls the brightness via keyboard function keys on that too just fine.

I had some occasional brightness control issues on the 30" ACD after wake-from-sleep with my 12" MacBook but that was going through a mess of daisychained dongles, including a third party USB-C multi-function dongle. The single USB-C port on the 12" MacBook is a major PITA. So far that hasn't been an issue with the Mac mini with its native Thunderbolt 2 / mini-DP ports and plethora of USB-A ports (to directly connect the USB necessary for brightness control).

 

[Amethyst1]

I just tested this with the Mac mini plugged into a 2010 2560x1440 iMac in target display mode. This shows the proper resolution and proper Apple symbol and progress bar sizes. However, it's plugged in directly via a mini-DisplayPort cable. No dual-link DVI adapter involved.

You might be able daisy-chain a dual-link DVI to DisplayPort adapter to the DisplayPort to dual-link DVI adapter to test the latter’s behaviour with the iMac’s display (LOL!).