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Mac Pro 2013 Triple Display Issue (Monitor "sleep loop")

Before I start this thread, "Get a PC" is unfortunately not an option. I'm using a Mac Pro (late 2013 model running High Sierra) at work specifically so I can share Premiere Pro project files with the rest of the editing group without filepath conflicts, and previously was using a PC. After attempting a combination of VNC and Synergy, it was concluded that I should connect all of my monitors to my Mac and just remote to my Windows desktop for IT tasks. All was well until I tried to use a total of three displays, though I was aware of some strange compatibility requirements concerning the type of connectors with Macs. I first tried using two mini displayport to DVI adapters in thunderbolt bus 1 and 2, and then connected my third display with an HDMI to DVI adapter. No matter what I tried, the last display connected would show the sleep message, go black, and then return to the sleep message, and cycle repeatedly. Switching what monitor was connected where or using an HDMI to HDMI cable (one of my displays has HDMI in addition to VGA and DVI) had no effect. I then found a mini displayport to VGA adapter, which surprisingly allowed all three displays to function flawlessly, but the VGA connected display was hopelessly blurry. I then concluded that the issue resulted from using both the HDMI and thunderbolt ports on the Mac and found a third mini displayport to DVI adapter, which again did not work (however, this one was not an official apple cable like the first two), causing the same "sleep loop" issue. It would seem that there is some issue with using three DVI monitors with a Mac Pro depending on how they are connected. Can someone with more OS X experience explain what cable setup I would need to make this work? Or if it's possible at all?

 

The monitors in question are three old mismatched ones:

 

Dell ST2420L (DVI, VGA)

Dell P2412H (HDMI, DVI, VGA)

Samsung EX2220 (DVI, VGA)

 

The graphics card is an AMD FirePro D300.

 

What does work:

mini dp to DVI

mini dp to DVI

mini dp to VGA

 

What does not work (only two of the three displays will function):

mini dp to DVI

mini dp to DVI

mini dp to DVI

 

mini dp to DVI

mini dp to DVI

HDMI to DVI

 

mini dp to DVI

mini dp to DVI

HDMI to HDMI

 

What'd like to make work: 3 digital connections

PC Specs:

CPU: AMD 1700x Cooler: Corsair H100i V2 Motherboard: Asus Crosshair VI Hero RAM: 4 * 8GB G.Skill RGB DDR4 Graphics: EVGA GTX 1080 Ti SC2 Storage: Samsung 960 EVO 500GB Case: Fractal Design Meshify C PSU: EVGA 750w G3 Monitors: Dell SG2716DG +  2x Dell U2515H

 

Freenas specs:

CPU: Intel Xeon E5-2650 V2 Cooler: Some noctua cooler Motherboard: Supermicro X9 SRL-F RAM: 8 * 8GB Samsung DDR3 ECC Storage: 6 * 4TB Seagate 7200 RPM RAIDZ2 Controller: LSI H220 Case: Phanteks Enthoo Pro PSU: EVGA 650w G3

 

Phone: iPhone 6S 32 GB Space Grey

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Which monitors are you trying to connect to? Looking at the spec sheet, I see that that that Mac Pro supports only 6 display outputs despite having 7 ports with video out capability. That loan HDMI port could be throwing a wrench in this. 

 

I suggest trying display port adapters only and sticking with more modern standards like HDMI and DisplayPort if possible. 

Laptop: 2019 16" MacBook Pro i7, 512GB, 5300M 4GB, 16GB DDR4 | Phone: iPhone 13 Pro Max 128GB | Wearables: Apple Watch SE | Car: 2007 Ford Taurus SE | CPU: R7 5700X | Mobo: ASRock B450M Pro4 | RAM: 32GB 3200 | GPU: ASRock RX 5700 8GB | Case: Apple PowerMac G5 | OS: Win 11 | Storage: 1TB Crucial P3 NVME SSD, 1TB PNY CS900, & 4TB WD Blue HDD | PSU: Be Quiet! Pure Power 11 600W | Display: LG 27GL83A-B 1440p @ 144Hz, Dell S2719DGF 1440p @144Hz | Cooling: Wraith Prism | Keyboard: G610 Orion Cherry MX Brown | Mouse: G305 | Audio: Audio Technica ATH-M50X & Blue Snowball | Server: 2018 Core i3 Mac mini, 128GB SSD, Intel UHD 630, 16GB DDR4 | Storage: OWC Mercury Elite Pro Quad (6TB WD Blue HDD, 12TB Seagate Barracuda, 1TB Crucial SSD, 2TB Seagate Barracuda HDD)
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9 hours ago, DrMacintosh said:

Which monitors are you trying to connect to? Looking at the spec sheet, I see that that that Mac Pro supports only 6 display outputs despite having 7 ports with video out capability. That loan HDMI port could be throwing a wrench in this. 

 

I suggest trying display port adapters only and sticking with more modern standards like HDMI and DisplayPort if possible. 

Let me edit my original post quick. I thought that could be an issue as well, but I've tried using three mini dp to DVI adaptors to no avail.

 

From the Apple website I see this: 

Mac Pro supports a total of two DVI or HDMI displays when connected via the built-in HDMI port or using the Apple Mini DisplayPort to DVI adapter. To connect additional DVI displays, use an active DVI adapter like the Apple Mini DisplayPort to Dual-Link DVI adapter. You can connect up to six active adapter DVI displays.

 

But the active adapter they list looks identical to the ones I have, unless the inactive ones are physically the same.

PC Specs:

CPU: AMD 1700x Cooler: Corsair H100i V2 Motherboard: Asus Crosshair VI Hero RAM: 4 * 8GB G.Skill RGB DDR4 Graphics: EVGA GTX 1080 Ti SC2 Storage: Samsung 960 EVO 500GB Case: Fractal Design Meshify C PSU: EVGA 750w G3 Monitors: Dell SG2716DG +  2x Dell U2515H

 

Freenas specs:

CPU: Intel Xeon E5-2650 V2 Cooler: Some noctua cooler Motherboard: Supermicro X9 SRL-F RAM: 8 * 8GB Samsung DDR3 ECC Storage: 6 * 4TB Seagate 7200 RPM RAIDZ2 Controller: LSI H220 Case: Phanteks Enthoo Pro PSU: EVGA 650w G3

 

Phone: iPhone 6S 32 GB Space Grey

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do the adapters have model numbers?

I live in misery USA. my timezone is central daylight time which is either UTC -5 or -4 because the government hates everyone.

into trains? here's the model railroad thread!

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6 minutes ago, will4623 said:

do the adapters have model numbers?

A1305

PC Specs:

CPU: AMD 1700x Cooler: Corsair H100i V2 Motherboard: Asus Crosshair VI Hero RAM: 4 * 8GB G.Skill RGB DDR4 Graphics: EVGA GTX 1080 Ti SC2 Storage: Samsung 960 EVO 500GB Case: Fractal Design Meshify C PSU: EVGA 750w G3 Monitors: Dell SG2716DG +  2x Dell U2515H

 

Freenas specs:

CPU: Intel Xeon E5-2650 V2 Cooler: Some noctua cooler Motherboard: Supermicro X9 SRL-F RAM: 8 * 8GB Samsung DDR3 ECC Storage: 6 * 4TB Seagate 7200 RPM RAIDZ2 Controller: LSI H220 Case: Phanteks Enthoo Pro PSU: EVGA 650w G3

 

Phone: iPhone 6S 32 GB Space Grey

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5 minutes ago, ThatFlashCat said:

A1305 

can't find out wether it is active or passive but it looks passive to me.

I live in misery USA. my timezone is central daylight time which is either UTC -5 or -4 because the government hates everyone.

into trains? here's the model railroad thread!

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If I remember correctly, this is a GPU display limitation. The card can't spit out more than two legacy signals (anything not displayport)

 

Any displays after two must appear as displayport to the GPU. Your displayport to VGA adapter is natively getting displayport from the GPU, since it has an active converter from DP to VGA, hence why 3 panels work.

 

The DP to DVI adapters just tell the GPU "Hey, I know this is a DP connector, but can you output DVI in legacy mode here?"

 

Since you're already using two legacy signals, the third must be an active adapter that doesn't need the GPU to run in legacy mode. Pick up an active Mini DP to DVI adapter and the third display should work.

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2 minutes ago, iamdarkyoshi said:

If I remember correctly, this is a GPU display limitation. The card can't spit out more than two legacy signals (anything not displayport)

 

Any displays after two must appear as displayport to the GPU. Your displayport to VGA adapter is natively getting displayport from the GPU, since it has an active converter from DP to VGA, hence why 3 panels work.

 

The DP to DVI adapters just tell the GPU "Hey, I know this is a DP connector, but can you output DVI in legacy mode here?"

 

Since you're already using two legacy signals, the third must be an active adapter that doesn't need the GPU to run in legacy mode. Pick up an active Mini DP to DVI adapter and the third display should work.

Do you think it needs to be one from Apple or should any active adapter work?

PC Specs:

CPU: AMD 1700x Cooler: Corsair H100i V2 Motherboard: Asus Crosshair VI Hero RAM: 4 * 8GB G.Skill RGB DDR4 Graphics: EVGA GTX 1080 Ti SC2 Storage: Samsung 960 EVO 500GB Case: Fractal Design Meshify C PSU: EVGA 750w G3 Monitors: Dell SG2716DG +  2x Dell U2515H

 

Freenas specs:

CPU: Intel Xeon E5-2650 V2 Cooler: Some noctua cooler Motherboard: Supermicro X9 SRL-F RAM: 8 * 8GB Samsung DDR3 ECC Storage: 6 * 4TB Seagate 7200 RPM RAIDZ2 Controller: LSI H220 Case: Phanteks Enthoo Pro PSU: EVGA 650w G3

 

Phone: iPhone 6S 32 GB Space Grey

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3 minutes ago, ThatFlashCat said:

Do you think it needs to be one from Apple or should any active adapter work?

Not an expert, but what he says seems to make sense to me, and it seems like any old ACTIVE displayport adapter should work.

PC SPECS: CPU: Intel Core i7 3770k @4.4GHz - Mobo: Asrock Extreme 4 (Z77) - GPU: MSI GeForce GTX 680 Twin Frozr 2GB - RAM: Crucial Ballistix 2x4GB (8GB) 1600MHz CL8 + 1x8GB - Storage: SSD: Sandisk Extreme II 120GB. HDD: Seagate Barracuda 1TB - PSU: be quiet! Pure Power L8 630W semi modular  - Case: Corsair Obsidian 450D  - OS: Windows 7

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3 minutes ago, ThatFlashCat said:

Do you think it needs to be one from Apple or should any active adapter work?

Any active adapter should work. In the meantime, try hitting auto adjust on the VGA panel or another VGA cable, may sharpen it up.

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1 minute ago, iamdarkyoshi said:

Any active adapter should work. In the meantime, try hitting auto adjust on the VGA panel or another VGA cable, may sharpen it up.

WOW auto adjust practically fixed it, the color looks a little off compared to before but it's totally usable now.

 

Thanks all!

PC Specs:

CPU: AMD 1700x Cooler: Corsair H100i V2 Motherboard: Asus Crosshair VI Hero RAM: 4 * 8GB G.Skill RGB DDR4 Graphics: EVGA GTX 1080 Ti SC2 Storage: Samsung 960 EVO 500GB Case: Fractal Design Meshify C PSU: EVGA 750w G3 Monitors: Dell SG2716DG +  2x Dell U2515H

 

Freenas specs:

CPU: Intel Xeon E5-2650 V2 Cooler: Some noctua cooler Motherboard: Supermicro X9 SRL-F RAM: 8 * 8GB Samsung DDR3 ECC Storage: 6 * 4TB Seagate 7200 RPM RAIDZ2 Controller: LSI H220 Case: Phanteks Enthoo Pro PSU: EVGA 650w G3

 

Phone: iPhone 6S 32 GB Space Grey

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