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Comment by jader201 | Hacker News Reader

It’s ridiculous that the base and Pro only support 1 and 2 external displays, respectively.

Want 3 monitors? Have to pay for the Max.

https://www.macrumors.com/2023/11/02/m3-chip-still-supports-...

From what I know, this isn't some artificial limitation that Apple imposes. Adding support has a cost that most customers don't need to pay.

Regardless, most people aren't going to be plugging in three monitors into their laptops, so most people aren't going to care about this.

  > Adding support has a cost that most customers don't need to pay.

It also adds heat, battery consumption, and space. For a chip that will also be used in iPads. Still I wished the base M3 chip supported at least two external displays. Or at least let you use two by disabling the internal display (eg. clamshell mode or whatever).

  > most people aren't going to be plugging in three monitors into their laptops, so most people aren't going to care about this.

Last summer (2022), or thereabouts, I got a survey request from Apple where they asked how much I cared about external monitor support, followed by subsequent questions about the number of external displays that was important to me. So, Apple's looking at it.

It's entirely Apple's choice to use the M chips in iPads. And if that means they need to compromise on laptop performance or features, they should change course.

Do you want Apple to drop some of their existing products, or do you want them to make more chip designs each generation with fewer economies of scale for each?

Apple still uses iPhone chips in the iPad and iPad Mini, and at this point I'd say they're more than fast enough. The iPad Air and Pro with M chips seem to me to be unnecessarily powerful for a device that runs iPadOS and therefore can only run apps from the App Store, etc. IMO, people don't buy iPad Airs and Pros over the standard iPad or Mini because they need the performance of the M chip. It's the rest of what's in the package.

If I ever have to try to plug more than two monitors into a laptop at that point I'm going to start asking myself why I'm not just buying a tower instead. The whole point of laptops is portability.

> The whole point of laptops is portability.

Many people want portability, but also want to use external displays at home or at the office .

Intel support 4 displays on a bottom end i5-1235U.

Even my crappy little Lenovo M600 with an N-series Celeron supports 3 displays. Two 4k ones fine. I didn't have a third to test it with.

It's either an architectural fuck up or intentional segmentation.

> It's either an architectural fuck up or intentional segmentation.

Do you think there is any chance that Apple would have had to make some engineering compromise (cost, performance, efficiency) for a feature that very few people would use?

Really you’re complaining you can’t plug in a 4th display into your computer? The fraction of the population who does can afford the Max, together with the 3 extra monitors.

I’m not trying to justify Apple here, but this usage seems quite niche and it’s understandable to me to need a non-base setup. It doesn’t sound ridiculous at all. As a matter of fact, the vast majority of notebook users never even plug a single monitor in.

I might argue that what you are describing is exactly why it's a bit absurd. It would be surprising to me as a user to discover such a limitation. If I didn't read about it here, I would probably find out after the return window and then be pissed that they took a stand on this particular artificial market segmentation.

The vast majority of people wouldn't return something because it doesn't have a feature they weren't even aware in the first place that it didn't have, because they don't need it. That's just weird.

You're forgetting another group of people, those that assume it's there because it's basic functionality

Perhaps they should also only allow users to plug in an external mouse if you buy the pro or Max chip.

I’m using the same Dell 1920x1200 monitors I’ve had for 10 years. And have been using them across many desktops and laptops. Including my current 2018 MBP that happily supports them (via 3 native USB-C ports, with one left over for a hub).

I say it’s ridiculous because the computers I’ve been using over the past 10 years — most of them much less expensive than a Max — have had no issues with them. Not because it’s a common need.

Apple may be setting up for this to be a killer feature with Apple Vision headsets.

They are saying a single 4K feed, but if you could break that into segments it would change the game. That would be 4 x 1080p screens + the laptop.

If you could slice the rectangles anyway you wanted and rotate them individually then you have the perfect environment. Which you would be able to change instantly, presumably, with Mission Control.

Personally I would pay lots of dollars for that.

Speaking of...

Can I sidecar to two or more iPads with this yet?

"Use an iPad as a second display for a Mac"

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT210380

Why on earth would you want this when you can get much nicer screens for fractions of the price?

One I can understand as I used to travel with my iPad Pro and used it as a second screen. But two? I’ve switched to a much lighter and much nicer UHD HDR usb-c monitor that is amazing for the price and the weight difference.

You also don’t get the random disconnections when sidecar weirds out for no reason.

It’s called command right arrow. Try it. I think someone did a study and found people cannot use more than two. Everything else you’re better off using desktop management.

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