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Comment by JumpCrisscross | Hacker News Reader

Can these drive more than one external monitor?

Indeed. The M1 Max can drive 3 6K monitors and a 4K TV all at once. Why? Professional film editors and color graders. You can be working on the three 6K monitors and then Output your render to the 4K TV simultaneously

2x6K on the Pro, 3x6K + 1x4K on the Max. The 4K seems to be because that's the limit of the HDMI port.

No mention of MST though.

I’m assuming that running multiple 5-6k monitors will still require multiple cables/ports though. One thunderbolt port per monitor.

I’m still waiting for the day we can hook 2 5k monitors + peripherals up to a thunderbolt dock and then hook that up to a MacBook using a single cable.

MST is not supported and won't be supported, that's been Apple policy for some time now. Only Thunderbolt tunneling is supported for multiple screens on one output (which logically provides separate DP outputs, no MST)

XDR Pro Display was the only external monitor mentioned, and was shown connected a few times. Screenshots and below details here: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/pro-display-xdr-owners-...

Also specific statements:

- M1 Pro SoC supports two XDR Pro Display

- M1 Max SoC was highlighted (Connectivity: Display Support -> 33:50):

    - Supports three XDR Pro Displays and a 4k television simultaneously  

    - "75 Million pixels of real estate."

    - Highlighted still having free ports with this setup.

It was shown driving 4 external monitors

The real question is can you plug in a display and not get kernel panics.

I see myself in this one and I don’t like it.

Yes, the live-stream showed a MacBook Pro connected to many monitors

up to 4

Yes. Up to three on Max.

yay more-nitors!

Yes. The Pro and Max can drive 2 XDR displays.

> XDR

What does that mean?

The 6K pro monitor Apple sells.

Just so I don't misunderstand, does that mean I need XDR or will it work with any monitor? I was very surprised to see that the original M1 only supported one external monitor so just want to confirm before I press buy.

No it will, it's just a very demanding monitor so if it can run multiple of those it will have no problem with random 1080p or 4K monitors.

It will of course work with other monitors, but there aren't that many high res monitors out there. The Apple display is the only 6k monitor I know of. There are a few 5k monitors and lots of 4k monitors.

There's one 8k monitor from Dell, but I don't think it's supported by macOS yet.

It's their marketing term for their HDR tech. The XDR displays are their flagship media productivity monitors. The new screens in the 14/16 inch MacBooks have "XDR" tech as well.

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