New Macbook Air supports 3 screens.

[Ciber]

Here's my new air driving dual thunderbolt displays plus the built-in screen. I can finally get rid of that mac mini on my desk! This was the only thing missing from my old air that kept it from being perfect. Now i need one of those silly magsafe to magsafe2 adapters... sigh

https://www.dropbox.com/s/mxgvgd6gjr4x7oa/photo.JPG

 

[TheStu]

Here's my new air driving dual thunderbolt displays plus the built-in screen. I can finally get rid of that mac mini on my desk! This was the only thing missing from my old air that kept it from being perfect. Now i need one of those silly magsafe to magsafe2 adapters... sigh

https://www.dropbox.com/s/mxgvgd6gjr4x7oa/photo.JPG

The thing I want to know is if the new Retina Pro can drive 4 Thunderbolt displays. If so... DAMN.

 

[Ciber]

The thing I want to know is if the new Retina Pro can drive 4 Thunderbolt displays. If so... DAMN.

When they finally deliver the Retina Pro i ordered i'll let you know.

 

[JackBurton]

I'm interested as well. Not planning on driving 4 Thunderbolt displays, but interested nonetheless.

 

[TheStu]

Yea, personally, I am not sure why I would spend $1200 on the laptop and then $2000 on displays for it, but it is nice to know that if I ever have $3000 to burn on nothing else, the dream can be realized

 

[Kadarin]

Yea, personally, I am not sure why I would spend $1200 on the laptop and then $2000 on displays for it, but it is nice to know that if I ever have $3000 to burn on nothing else, the dream can be realized

I can see it... If you do work that goes much faster with two large displays (I do, I have 2 27" displays here @ work) and also want the extreme portability of the MBA, it all works and works well.

 

[Bateluer]

Here's my new air driving dual thunderbolt displays plus the built-in screen. I can finally get rid of that mac mini on my desk! This was the only thing missing from my old air that kept it from being perfect. Now i need one of those silly magsafe to magsafe2 adapters... sigh

https://www.dropbox.com/s/mxgvgd6gjr4x7oa/photo.JPG

Any issues with the HD4000 driving 3 panels? Performance-wise.

 

[Ciber]

Any issues with the HD4000 driving 3 panels? Performance-wise.

Surprisingly, No. It is smooth as butter under Lion 10.7.4 and Mountain Lion Preview 4. I have two of the 11" 2 GHz i7's with the 8GB of ram and no performance issues at all. I can also confirm that the SSD connector changed, my OWC Sandforce drives do not fit the new air. Both of the SSD's from Apple are Samsung.

PS: I did try 3 Thunderbolt displays, but the third one never came on, even if i closed the laptop to disable the built-in screen.

 

[TheStu]

Surprisingly, No. It is smooth as butter under Lion 10.7.4 and Mountain Lion Preview 4. I have two of the 11" 2 GHz i7's with the 8GB of ram and no performance issues at all. I can also confirm that the SSD connector changed, my OWC Sandforce drives do not fit the new air. Both of the SSD's from Apple are Samsung.

PS: I did try 3 Thunderbolt displays, but the third one never came on, even if i closed the laptop to disable the built-in screen.

I think that the Thunderbolt chipset has a display limit. There is plenty of bandwidth on the pipe but there are 2 different chips, Eagle Ridge and Cactus Ridge, one of those was in the 2011 Air and could only drive 1 display, the other can drive 2.

 

[Red Storm]

Have they fixed the issue where if you set an app full screen, all other connected displays go gray? Apparently this was a "feature" of Lion but until it gets fixed the Air could support 99 simultaneous displays and it'd still be useless if you can't use full screen and multiple displays at the same time.

 

[jalaram]

Silly question since I don't own any of the above tech. Can it also support 2 non-TB displays using adapter cables?

 

[TheStu]

Silly question since I don't own any of the above tech. Can it also support 2 non-TB displays using adapter cables?

It only has the one thunderbolt port on it, so I guess theoretically a breakout box could be made that has dual DVI on it or something...

The theoretical part is the dual display outputs. I know that Belkin is working on one, but they keep pushing out the release date for some reason.

 

[Koing]

Looks sweet!

Koing

 

[RyanG13]

Would it be possible for you to do a short video demo of this setup, maybe showing a window dragged across all the screens? I am about to buy a new air but an apple sales rep told me that they do not support daisy-chained dual thunderbolt displays. This is an important feature to me on my current pro. Thanks!

 

[TheStu]

If you look at the display on the Air, it shows the display preferences where it has all 3 displays listed.

 

[Ciber]

Have they fixed the issue where if you set an app full screen, all other connected displays go gray? Apparently this was a "feature" of Lion but until it gets fixed the Air could support 99 simultaneous displays and it'd still be useless if you can't use full screen and multiple displays at the same time.

No, this nuisance is still there on mountain lion preview 4. I never use anything in full screen since it's a waste of space, but it is still annoying.

 

[mzr]

Have they fixed the issue where if you set an app full screen, all other connected displays go gray? Apparently this was a "feature" of Lion but until it gets fixed the Air could support 99 simultaneous displays and it'd still be useless if you can't use full screen and multiple displays at the same time.

Not sure on the Air, but I have a late 2007 MacBook that can full screen apps either on the built-in display or the external. Either way, the non-full screen display still remains usable. I hadn't tried it before 10.7.4, so it may have been fixed before then.

 

[Ciber]

Would it be possible for you to do a short video demo of this setup, maybe showing a window dragged across all the screens? I am about to buy a new air but an apple sales rep told me that they do not support daisy-chained dual thunderbolt displays. This is an important feature to me on my current pro. Thanks!

I will try to make one tomorrow. I confirmed it works on two air's. This feature is not listed anywhere on apple's site or any docs for some reason...

 

[ollyg]

Thanks for this report Ciber - really useful as I had also been told by my local Apple store that this wasn't possible.

Actually what I'd really like to know is whether the Air can support one Thunderbolt display and one non-TB display chained off the first TB display (via mini DisplayPort adapter). Any chance you or someone can check this out?

I was a bit disappointed that the Apple store wasn't interested in seeing what the new hardware could do! :\

 

[Ciber]

Thanks for this report Ciber - really useful as I had also been told by my local Apple store that this wasn't possible.

Actually what I'd really like to know is whether the Air can support one Thunderbolt display and one non-TB display chained off the first TB display (via mini DisplayPort adapter). Any chance you or someone can check this out?

I was a bit disappointed that the Apple store wasn't interested in seeing what the new hardware could do! :\

I will grab some adapters sometime today and try it.

 

[Eug]

No, this nuisance is still there on mountain lion preview 4. I never use anything in full screen since it's a waste of space, but it is still annoying.

It's moronic.

This is the only situation where I use the green button on the top of the app window.

 

[TheStu]

Thanks for this report Ciber - really useful as I had also been told by my local Apple store that this wasn't possible.

Actually what I'd really like to know is whether the Air can support one Thunderbolt display and one non-TB display chained off the first TB display (via mini DisplayPort adapter). Any chance you or someone can check this out?

I was a bit disappointed that the Apple store wasn't interested in seeing what the new hardware could do! :\

They may have just been busy. Shortly after the Thunderbolt Display came out, I went to my local Apple Store to see if you could connect the 2010 Airs to the new TB Displays. They were totally willing to help me out, but the only TB display they had in the place was occupied, nonstop*, by kids playing with PhotoBooth.

*Seriously, I came back about 30 minutes later, the same kids were still there playing with Photo Booth.

 

[Kaido]

Awesome, thanks for sharing!

 

[ollyg]

They may have just been busy.

Fair point... I tried to call at a quiet time but they did all seem a little distracted. I appreciate it's a fair bit of work to set up this test in the store where everything's bolted down. Fingers crossed that we can crowd-source the answer and let Google archive do the rest

 

[JavaMomma]

Have they fixed the issue where if you set an app full screen, all other connected displays go gray? Apparently this was a "feature" of Lion but until it gets fixed the Air could support 99 simultaneous displays and it'd still be useless if you can't use full screen and multiple displays at the same time.

This is so frustrating, it's what's holding me back from a multi-monitor system with OSX. I won't even consider dropping the cash on dual Thunderbolt monitors until it is fixed.