One of Two monitors stuck at 30Hz Refresh

Coop Guice · January 20, 2022

Hello! Long time reader here, first time poster.

I just recently purchased 2 new ASUS monitors (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B088MLC8PH?psc=1&ref=ppx_pop_dt_b_product_details) for a home gaming/work setup and am having some trouble getting them to both to operate at ~60hz of a refresh rate. One has no problem getting there, while the other is stuck at 30 despite me trying to change the settings. I would like to have both monitors at least providing a 1920x1080 and a 60hz refresh.

I have both monitors plugged into a Lenovo ThinkPad Dock (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07M6S81CM/ref=crt_ewc_title_srh_1?ie=UTF8&smid=A3HRO232JZD0FR&th=1) and have tried a dizzying array of different cables connecting to the monitors from the dock, including HDMI and Display port cords (admittedly, I haven't purchased any cords beyond what comes out of the box) but I still can't seem to get that refresh rate normalized across both monitors.

My machine is a Lenovo Thinkpad X390 (https://pcsupport.lenovo.com/us/en/products/laptops-and-netbooks/thinkpad-x-series-laptops/thinkpad-x390/20q0)

How the hell am I supposed to troubleshoot this?

Screen shots below:

AndreiArgeanu · January 20, 2022

Click display adapter properties for the display with the issues and click list all modes. Then if you can select the appropriate resolution and refresh rate for your display

IPD · January 20, 2022

Out of curiosity, have you tried swapping the display outputs between panels, while keeping everything else the same? Does it (30hz) shift from one monitor to the other, or does it stay on the same monitor? What about if you swap between inputs on the panels, does that change the refresh rate? I ask, because I know (for example) that on my display, one of the HDMI ports will only do 30hz, and the other does 60hz (both at 4k). I don't expect that this is a bandwidth limitation for 1080p, but I might as well ask.

That dock also says nothing about what DP and HDMI standards it has. Could be 1.0 HDMI for all I know.