I received my third display today and have confirmed that it works with a single Pro Vega II Single card. No need for a Duo or two graphics cards.
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MP 7,1 PSA: Pro Vega II Single can power 3x XDR Displays!
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The juxtaposition of this room with the equipment is confusing.
I fear it has been kidnapped. Call the police.
This is a warehouse where I run my business. It’s located in a massive incubator building and is on a short-term lease. Spending money to improve the space benefits me zero. I work alone and often do things in the space that would damage or otherwise tarnish a well finished area. It’s a complete waste of time, energy, and money to try to improve the look of the warehouse.
I’d appreciate it if that was overlooked and the focus put back on the fact that the video card that is advertised by Apple to only support two XDR’s actually can support three. This tells me that there is some trickery happening with the system-routed DisplayPort streams. I’ve tried plugging a fourth monitor (TB display) into any of the open TB ports and I get zero signal. Kinda weird...
I’d appreciate it if that was overlooked and the focus put back on the fact that the video card that is advertised by Apple to only support two XDR’s actually can support three. This tells me that there is some trickery happening with the system-routed DisplayPort streams. I’ve tried plugging a fourth monitor (TB display) into any of the open TB ports and I get zero signal. Kinda weird...
No disrespect intended. Given the cost of the setup it makes sense that the setup is in a professional environment. Apologies for any miscommunication.
On the topic of the GPU driving three displays, that’s bizarre. Maybe there are edge cases that might crop up due to lack of official support? Have there been any issues?
The location really is a tangent ( it is a bit odd from the usual placements though. Hence attracts attention ).
There is no "trickery" needed here at all. The Vega II Solo puts out 6 display streams. Even Apple's initial help documents essentially said so. ( two DP streams internal and two streams to each of the two TB controllers on the card edge). Each XDR monitor only needs two DP streams. The recent Apple Mac Pro technical document only makes it even more explicitly clear.
Can the Vega II "light up" three monitors with simple, static, 2D images shouldn't have been a problem.
What is the performance of the card under that load for non trivial tasks is the more open question as to whether Appel's "two" limit is justified or not. If dragging windows 'tears' easily . the Finder's 3d effects stutter , or rendering stutters then the limitation could have some grounded justifications. There is decent change that three XDRs stretches the raster ops processing ability of the Vega II pretty thin. How far is "too thin" is probably somewhat of a judgement call.
Not (at least from the public facing docs) . Apple's Mac Pro tech specs from June 3 2019 (launch day).
"...Support for up to six 4K displays, three 5K displays, or two Pro Display XDRs ..."
Mac Pro - Technical Specifications
See the tech specs for the new Mac Pro including processor, memory, graphics and Afterburner.
web.archive.org
The expectation should have been for three. 5K or 6K shouldn't make a substantive difference in lighting up a 2D image on the display.
That may have leaked from pre-launch specs covered in NDA , but Apple has been pretty consistent since have talked openly about the Vega II cards.
The Vega II Duo is set up to handle 3 XDRs better ( in terms of spreading the load). Two XDRs will be on one Vega GPU die and the one XDR on the other other GPU die . ( the 2nd GPU die it set to feed the 'top'/'front' TB controller and TB bus (controller) 1 edge ports). So three will spread out the load no matter which other ports use ( I/O card's on back or top/front ).
I suspect also probably didn't want to get the W5700X and Vega II into a "how well support" 3 XDR comparison sweepstakes contest. Short term the push would be to the Vega II Duo but pretty soon for folks with mainly 2D imagery ( audio, photography , and most video ) the Vega II wouldn't look good anyway.
I think OkiRun got a bit confused by how macOS reports the two portrait displays.
Can you provide a link that explains why the XDR resolution is auto changed downward in portrait mode? Thanks for any consideration. Wanting to learn more.
First I thought the same, but it's just reported in a different order, short side first 3384x6016 looks like 1692x3008. Which is equal in pixels (and 6K I believe) to 6016x3384 looks like 3008x1692.
Maybe that's what we are talking about here?
Maybe that's what we are talking about here?
Thanks for that clarification! I didn't know about it! It just struck me that the resolutions are listed differently based on the 'mode' of the XDR and I thought that meant they were not being 'lit up' in 6k resolution. My bad.
Can you post result of the following command to show that all displays are connected using dual HBR3?
Code:
/System/Library/Extensions/AppleGraphicsControl.kext/Contents/MacOS/AGDCDiagnose -a > AGDCDiagnose_trippleXDR_VegaII.txt 2>&1Looks good. All three are connected as dual HBR3, two EDIDs per display - one for left tile and one for the right tile of the display. The only thing that differs between EDIDs is the identifying information: serial number (used for matching two tiles to the same display), and ContainerID (used for matching USB devices to a display). All displays appear to be running at 6016x3384, 10 bpc, 648910 kHz pixel clock for each tile (1297.820 MHz total). Two of the displays are rotated.
Code:
* 1: [DP 1.4 4 x HBR3] Status: [4 x HBR3 7777]
* 2: [DP 1.4 4 x HBR3] Status: [4 x HBR3 7777]
* 3: [DP 1.4 4 x HBR3] Status: [4 x HBR3 7777]
* 4: [DP 1.4 4 x HBR3] Status: [4 x HBR3 7777]
* 5: [DP 1.4 4 x HBR3] Status: [4 x HBR3 7777]
* 6: [DP 1.4 4 x HBR3] Status: [4 x HBR3 7777]The information is similar to what you provided previously in #18 except this time the third display is connected to the Vega II as dual HBR3 like the first two displays, instead of to the W5700 as single HBR2 with DSC and having only one EDID with no tile info.
All that remains is to figure out why Apple says that only two XDR displays are supported by the Vega II.
Thank you for posting this. I am genuinely surprised (and impressed) because I was unsuccessful doing this. At the time I thought it was a system limitation but I guess it was an error on my part.
I have two Mac Pro 7.1s. Each has a single AMD Radeon Pro Vega II 32 GB video board, so we have the same setup. I bought three XDR monitors. When I tried to connect three to one Mac Pro two of the monitors dimmed noticeably. I could have sworn I plugged one into each of the two video card busses and then one on top. (but obviously I did not do it right)
My third XDR is now at my office so I will have to bring it back. When I do, where did you plug in the third monitor?
Thanks again for sharing this.
Sean
I have two Mac Pro 7.1s. Each has a single AMD Radeon Pro Vega II 32 GB video board, so we have the same setup. I bought three XDR monitors. When I tried to connect three to one Mac Pro two of the monitors dimmed noticeably. I could have sworn I plugged one into each of the two video card busses and then one on top. (but obviously I did not do it right)
My third XDR is now at my office so I will have to bring it back. When I do, where did you plug in the third monitor?
Thanks again for sharing this.
Sean
The first and second monitors are attached to Port 1 and Port 3 (Bus 0-port 1 and Bus 1-port 1) in the above image, respectively. The third monitor is attached the first Thunderbolt port on the Apple I/O card (port just next to the headphone jack).
The first and second monitors are attached to Port 1 and Port 3 (Bus 0-port 1 and Bus 1-port 1) in the above image, respectively. The third monitor is attached the first Thunderbolt port on the Apple I/O card (port just next to the headphone jack).
Thanks again. I can't wait to try this out.
Sean
I am happy to confirm what @straightMacin has demonstrated: the AMD Radeon Pro Vega II 32 GB can drive three XDR monitors in 6K at 60Hz. I guess I plugged the third monitor into Bus 0 or Bus 1 when I tried this a couple months ago. But my third XDR arrived yesterday and when I plugged it into the Bus 2 it worked perfectly.
