Notification Thread for Carlo for when Mavericks and DisplayLink Play Nice

[dispnev]

I would like to make this thread so that Carlo can update us when DisplayLink and Mavericks work well together. So anyone in the same boat (which is ... everyone?) can subscribe to this thread and get notified that it's okay to upgrade to Mavericks.

Since October I've been checking these forums every week or so, and it's getting frustrating. I want to upgrade to Mavericks, but don't want to lose my DL monitors.

To get notified of progress, post 'me too' or something, and get on the thread subscription list. Hopefully Carlo will keep us updated, but anyone can update us, really.

[mifiguer]

Can't wait to try something! Going back to single monitor + laptop display really sucks! :(

[EddieMa]

Edit: Oops Sorry -- Oops -- wow. Saw a sticky post and didn't see the date: Nov 2013 -- nevermind.

[ehendrix]

I just checked, it is still the 2.1 driver which has been out for a few months now.

[Gracefull]

Mee Three....

[IndustrialEcho]

I understand it takes some effort to fix the software, but come on guys! This is unfair to any of us that bought your hardware. v2.1 does not work any more.

v2.2 Please!

[paultzirides]

Hey folks, just wanted to post my good experience.

I am currently using:
MacBook Air (Mid-2012)
Anker USB 3.0 Dual-display dock (HDMI and DVI)
Dell 1905 FP
Dell 1908 FP
DisplayLink 2.1 Drivers

The setup works phenomenally, with almost no lag and a small amount of visual aberration (flickering on when resizing windows/zooming in on web page content, etc.).

I have the exact same dock at my office, with two identical Acer displays (model number escapes me, resolution is 1080p). That setup does not work as expected. Both displays appear in the "Displays" Preference Pane, but only one is active.

My thoughts:

Dual 1080p displays may be causing problems
Two identical displays may cause problems (my home setup has two different displays, despite being the same resolution).


Hope that helps.

[IndustrialEcho]

Ok, so not sure what changed, but I just plugged my second monitor in and viola! It works! I am still on v2.1.

/me scratches head

[Carlo]

Hi Everyone,

We have tested the latest 10.9.2 preview and unfortunately we have not found any fixes.

If you look at the list at http://www.displaylink.com/support/ticket.php?id=354 so far we have confirmed that all issues but one are due to OS regressions.
The "Second DisplayLink display connected may be blank" issue is still not 100% confirmed but it looks very likely to be another OS-induced issue.

This does not mean that we are powerless: as I wrote in other threads we can work around a few issues and are working on them. One in particular turned out to be trickier than expected but we're not far from a solution.
As usual it would be unwise to give release dates, sorry.

In any case for all issues is worth raising a bug on bugreport.apple.com. I'm told these bug reports are being read and duplicate reports are useful to increase the priority of issues.

I know this update is not very satisfactory and the worry is to have another 10.8 with OS fixes coming one year after version 10.8.0. We continue to explore all options to avoid that.

I leave you with a possible workaround for multiple external screens: we've been told that some issues are influenced by the order the devices are seen by the OS. You may want to experiment with that.

Cheers,
Carlo

[kamil6x]

My experience is that the HDMI display works after a reboot of OS X.
Scenario:
1)plug in to workstation 1 with displaylink 3900 dvi, HDMI and both displays work.
2)switch to workstation 2 with displaylink single DVI box at different workstation and monitor works.
3)switch back to workstation 1 and DVI works, but HDMI doesn't; have to reboot OS X mavericks for HDMI to work.

[JamesGuymer]

Hi James,

This is a follow-up regarding Bug ID# 15945748.

Engineering has determined that this is an issue for a third party to resolve.

Apple doesn't create those drivers, DisplayLink does, so not a lot we can do about it. Don't know what calls they're making that would behave differently.

If you have questions regarding the resolution of this issue, please update your bug report with them.

We are closing this report.

Please be sure to regularly check new Apple releases for any updates that might affect this issue.

Thank you for your assistance in helping us discover and isolate bugs within our products.

Best Regards,

Developer Bug Reporting Team
Apple Worldwide Developer Relations

************************************************** ********************************************
THE INFORMATION CONTAINED IN THIS MESSAGE IS UNDER NON-DISCLOSURE
************************************************** ********************************************
-------------------------------------------------------
Bug ID #: 15945748
Bug Title: Mavericks Not playing nice with Displaylink drivers
-------------------------------------------------------
<GMT30-Jan-2014 14:02:50GMT>
Summary:
Hi

I have an issue with mavericks and display link drivers, its a know issues apparently http://www.displaylink.com/support/ticket.php?id=354.

I was running 6 monitors off my mac book retina pro using 4 external graphic cards successfully until i upgraded to mavericks.

I can only get 3 running now, 2 of which are being run from the thunderbolt ports and 1 external card

Steps to Reproduce:
1) attach more than one external display link card and screen goes flickery and unusable

Expected Results:
6 monitors running in harmony

Actual Results:
d screen goes flickery and unusable

Version:
OS X 10.9.1 13B42

Notes:


Configuration:


Attachments:

[ehendrix]

Same answer I got from Apple about WindowServer crashing when doing "Show Desktop".
Yet, I have not seen the crashes anymore after updating to 10.9.1.

I think the problem here is that we do not know what DisplayLink uses from OSx. Hence our "bug reports" really are against the DisplayLink drivers. If instead the report would state more that by using this specific API within OSx this issue occurs then it would become more clear it is an issue in OSX.

[Carlo]

Hi,

Thank you for raising the issues. The answers you got are in line with the ones we got from the first level of support on most issues, which is disappointing of course but not unexpected. It's still useful to reiterate the importance of the issue, regardless of where the blame would lie: we'd love to have one or more fundamental bugs to fix to improve the user experience on Mavericks.

We take seriously our NDA with Apple and can't share details of our own communications with further levels of support.

So far it very much looks like 10.8: it took one year for exactly the same DisplayLink driver to go from unusable on 10.8.0 to a good user experience on 10.8.5.
Thank you for your help in trying to shorten that interval this time around.

Carlo

[EddieMa]

Any chance you would consider opening up the OS X driver software for us to look at? I bet some of us are CS students / developers that have worked with kernels before.

At the very least, the community could verify that the problem is indeed a kernel regression, which could add some weight when reporting the problem to Apple.

[jmwebguy]

MBP Late 2011 model. Before Mavericks, I used DisplayLink USB Docking station. One display connected directly via DVI. Two additional displays connected DVI to USB (plugged into docking station). And then the laptop display. Worked like perfection.

Now, I can only get 2 displays working with USB Dock (in addition to laptop). The one plugged directly into DVI and one DVI to USB. I always have to reset the display layout every morning. I try to connect the other DVI to USB and once in a blue moon it will connect but I can't access the screen.

So, are these the same issues others are reporting and seeing with Mavericks?

[jmwebguy]

2 monitors connected to DisplayLink (one direct DVI and one DVI to USB). The other monitor is connected with a DVI to HDMI then I have the HDMI connected to a HDMI to Thunderbolt adapter.

Still have to change layout each system start, but I can handle that.

[gtgweb]

I figured work around if i switch the monitor from USB >HDMI to scaled and 1600 x 900 it actually lights up and stays active.

the 24" dell monitor natively runs at 1920 x 1080 but since i am doing screen share on the third monitor to a remote MAC it actually doesn't take the scale and looks like a 1920 x 1080 display

[dispnev]

OMG, is there a fix coming? Another month has gone by.

I guess I need to find a Thunderbolt (TB) hub or something. I'm not going to buy Apple's TB monitors ($$$), but maybe a TB hub exists, so I can re-use these DVI monitors with TB to DVI adapters.

Ugh!

Has anyone seen a Thunderbolt hub that will do this? I did some looking a few weeks ago but didn't find anything.

[jkirker]

Any chance you would consider opening up the OS X driver software for us to look at? I bet some of us are CS students / developers that have worked with kernels before.

At the very least, the community could verify that the problem is indeed a kernel regression, which could add some weight when reporting the problem to Apple.

Eddie, had the same thought. What about opening up the driver to the development community. You guys are obviously resource strapped - either that or there is nothing that can be done and Apple is essentially Googling you out of business.

[dispnev]

Yeah, well, a few more months have gone by, ... any updates? ... no?

I tried the J5 USB adapters with Mavericks and two at once worked fine, but they don't allow rotating. If you don't need portrait mode, they are a good option.

Is multiple monitors on a macbook really so hard? Pretty soon OSX 10.10 will be out.

[alphadog]

Yeah, well, a few more months have gone by, ... any updates? ... no?

I tried the J5 USB adapters with Mavericks and two at once worked fine, but they don't allow rotating. If you don't need portrait mode, they are a good option.

Is multiple monitors on a macbook really so hard? Pretty soon OSX 10.10 will be out.

Definitely easier on windows. Even Thunderbolt is not a good solution.

[dispnev]

Yosemite is out now .... I totally missed Mavericks because of this. :mad:

I guess the Displaylink guys gave up and we have a dead product. :(

[alphadog]

Yosemite is out now .... I totally missed Mavericks because of this. :mad:

I guess the Displaylink guys gave up and we have a dead product. :(

I bought a Thunderbolt dock and will eBay my Dynadock. I loved the Dynadock for windows, but after a year of crashes (Window server and OS), it was time to say good bye.

If this is Apple's fault, then it just shows that they don't really care about DisplayLink technology, and will probably never fix the issue. I guess it is just not a big enough market for them to worry about consumer sentiment.

[colliding with logic]

DisplayLink has, at the time of my writing, had well over the [mumble...carry the seven...mumble] three hundred seventy five business days, since Mavericks rolled out, to address this matter.

We are to believe this is a bug that is part of Mac OS X, but only affects one of the several vendors that use DL's chosen route of using "standard Apple interfaces to integrate into OS X to add additional USB graphics displays"? With the way things have gone, I guess the time to write your own, functional hardware interface driver and roll out plan B to your proven customers, was quite some time ago.

but even if those claims are all true]
• the management decision to abandon existing customers to wait for a disinterested mega-corporation, combined with
• the engineers' decision to wait and wait and wait for Apple's vaporware patch with no in-house backup plan
was obviously the wrong path. Analysis and strategy aside, there's one takeaway I'd like to emphasize:

You are losing customers.

If you, my oddly-patient reader, are an employee at DL—I implore you to pass that message up the chain. We have money, we are paying attention, and we are jumping ship. Anecdotally for one, I have to give up on the company; in the sense of my considerable presently-installed hardware investments being decommissioned, with regard to my company's future purchases, and as far as my recommendations to others as their designated "tech guy I know who will tell me what to buy".