Dual Monitors on a Mac

Hey everyone. I have a macbook pro and I was wondering if there was any way to run dual monitors off of it? Is anyone doing this or can maybe help me with a setup? Thanks in advance!

wouldnt you need a video card with dual DVI out ports? or two video cards to achieve this?

EMiNd09 wrote in post #8389094
Hey everyone. I have a macbook pro and I was wondering if there was any way to run dual monitors off of it? Is anyone doing this or can maybe help me with a setup? Thanks in advance!

If you have a newer MacBook Pro (unibody), you need a mini-display port adapter for the connection to the monitor you intend to use. MBP's support mirroring or a 2nd display up to 2560 x 1600 resolution (Apple 30" Display size).

Earlier models have a DVI port, and came with a DVI to VGA adapter.

Oops, I forgot the second part of the question. To set up the 2nd monitor, run the System Preferences application from the dock. Click on 'Displays". If the second display doesn't show up, click the 'Detect Displays' button. Set up is pretty straightforward.

wlescall wrote in post #8389312
If you have a newer MacBook Pro (unibody), you need a mini-display port adapter for the connection to the monitor you intend to use. MBP's support mirroring or a 2nd display up to 2560 x 1600 resolution (Apple 30" Display size).............

Your still only running a single extra display, and have to use the laptop screen if you want to use dual monitors.


I believe EMiNd09 is asking if you can run 2 seperate monitors from the Macbook Pro.

I'm not aware of any laptops that will do this.


There are USB based solutions, but I have no idea how good they are.

You need a matrox dualhead2go if you want to run dual monitors, but basically forget about using apple monitors unless you plan on spending a hundred bucks extra on the display port version (dual display port output). Then again, if you are spending 1600 on cinema displays, an extra 100 bucks is probably in your budget. If you have a new macbook pro (2008/2009) though, you need the display port version anyway, as the other two require a vga out on your laptop.

EMiNd09 wrote in post #8389094
Hey everyone. I have a macbook pro and I was wondering if there was any way to run dual monitors off of it? Is anyone doing this or can maybe help me with a setup? Thanks in advance!

You can run one off of your DVI or DisplayPort and the other off USB (up to 1600x1200).

The main problem with the USB idea that people are suggesting is the fact that it's very bandwidth heavy, and most don't support 1920x1200. Combine that with the fact that you have only two ports and one controller on a macbook pro (15", 3 on 17", all 2009 specs), that means you can easily drown out any external drives if the USB monitor is playing video or updating the display rapidly (editing photoshop, games, poorly programed things, etc). And at full draw the extra overhead can be significant even on a 2009 model macbook pro. In general, if you get a USB monitor, get a low resolution one for displaying static images.

Thanks for all of the replies. I am not using apple monitors i have a dell for my desktop and I was going to get the same one refurbed from dell for a little over 100 dollars. I looked at the dualhead2go and it looks like it would work. thanks everyone