Retina MacBook Pro Can Run Three External Displays Simultaneously

Wednesday June 20, 2012 10:12 am PDT by Jordan Golson

Other World Computing posted this picture on their blog showing a MacBook Pro with Retina Display hooked up to a pair of iMacs serving as Thunderbolt displays and a third monitor via HDMI. This setup powers four screens with a total of 15,680,000 pixels.

The writer of the post, OWC Mike, seemed impressed with the performance of the MacBook Pro:

Moving images and media didn’t create any lag and we were able to play video on all four displays simultaneously.

Apple officially supports hooking three monitors into the Retina MacBook Pro, noting in the Thunderbolt ports FAQ in its Support Knowledge Base:

MacBook Pro (Retina, Mid 2012) can support an HDMI-compatible device on its HDMI port while also using two Thunderbolt displays.

This makes the Retina MacBook Pro the first Mac -- other than a tower-based workstation like the Mac Pro -- to natively power four displays simultaneously.

Top Rated Comments

kniemann

115 months ago

Unfortunately my wallet can't power four displays.

Score: 126 Votes (Like | Disagree)

basesloaded190

115 months ago

That's incredible. So much power in such a thin computer.

Score: 60 Votes (Like | Disagree)

Xian Zhu Xuande

115 months ago

I thought Thunderbolt was supposed to be powerful enough to support up to 10 monitors...

Thunderbolt can do things that the actual computer may not be able to do. In the case of monitors, while Thunderbolt can support 10 monitors, the hardware capabilities of a given computer may not be able to.

Score: 14 Votes (Like | Disagree)

ryanflanders256

115 months ago

Could a traditional 15" MacBook pro also do this with daisy-chained thunderbolt monitors?

Score: 8 Votes (Like | Disagree)

AQUADock

115 months ago

Wow that is an amazing amount of pixels for a computer so thin and light.

Score: 8 Votes (Like | Disagree)

Tal Ormanda

115 months ago

That's nice...but you're leaving out how hot it gets after doing so?

Score: 8 Votes (Like | Disagree)

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