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External monitor question (problem)
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driven
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Oct 12, 2014, 01:32 AM
 
When I am home, I "dock" my 2013 MacBook Pro to a USB hub. I have two external monitors running on it (one on HDMI, and the other DVI from one of the Thunderbolt ports).

I notice that when my displays go to sleep, and I wake it back up, I can no longer operate expose. The console shows a crash when I try to invoke it.

To fix this without rebooting, I run the following command (essentially killing and restarting the "dock" process:
osascript -e 'quit application "Dock"'

Does anyone know how to prevent this issue in the first place?
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reader50
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Oct 12, 2014, 03:17 AM
 
You didn't say what OS version.

I'd suggest connecting the external monitors one at a time and repeating the experiment. To see which monitor/connection method causes the problem. Ideally try connecting each monitor to each port as well, to see if it's tied to one of the monitors.
     
driven  (op)
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Oct 12, 2014, 10:41 AM
 
Originally Posted by reader50 View Post
You didn't say what OS version.

I'd suggest connecting the external monitors one at a time and repeating the experiment. To see which monitor/connection method causes the problem. Ideally try connecting each monitor to each port as well, to see if it's tied to one of the monitors.
Not a bad idea. I'll try just leaving one of the monitors connected before it goes to sleep. I'll post the results.
- MacBook Air M2 16GB / 512GB
- MacBook Pro 16" i9 2.4Ghz 32GB / 1TB
- MacBook Pro 15" i7 2.9Ghz 16GB / 512GB
- iMac i5 3.2Ghz 1TB
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driven  (op)
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Oct 13, 2014, 10:37 AM
 
OK. Tried it with just the HDMI monitor, and just the DVI monitor. (Both in clamshell mode). Not every time, but the problem does manifest itself in both cases. The most recent time, even running the kill dock command didn't fix it. I had to log out and re-log back in.

Has nobody else seen this?
- MacBook Air M2 16GB / 512GB
- MacBook Pro 16" i9 2.4Ghz 32GB / 1TB
- MacBook Pro 15" i7 2.9Ghz 16GB / 512GB
- iMac i5 3.2Ghz 1TB
- G4 Cube 500Mhz / Shelf display unit / Museum display
     
P
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Oct 13, 2014, 01:14 PM
 
Don't have that setup, but can you set the displays to sleep on no signal? If so, just disable display sleep and let the entire MBP sleep.
The new Mac Pro has up to 30 MB of cache inside the processor itself. That's more than the HD in my first Mac. Somehow I'm still running out of space.
     
driven  (op)
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Oct 13, 2014, 03:23 PM
 
Originally Posted by P View Post
Don't have that setup, but can you set the displays to sleep on no signal? If so, just disable display sleep and let the entire MBP sleep.
Yeah, tried it with the computer sleeping. Also tried it with only the display sleeping. (Sometimes I run a server in a VMware session)

Either way, same issue.

Wondering if this would also occur with the Thunderbolt display?

So far the only way I get this to NOT happen is to only use the built in Retina display.
- MacBook Air M2 16GB / 512GB
- MacBook Pro 16" i9 2.4Ghz 32GB / 1TB
- MacBook Pro 15" i7 2.9Ghz 16GB / 512GB
- iMac i5 3.2Ghz 1TB
- G4 Cube 500Mhz / Shelf display unit / Museum display
     
ghporter
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Oct 15, 2014, 06:54 AM
 
Do the displays themselves have options for sleep/shutdown with no signal? That might actually work whether the Mac tells them to sleep or not.

Glenn -----OTR/L, MOT, Tx
     
driven  (op)
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Oct 15, 2014, 08:47 AM
 
Yes. They are doing that. It's the wake up that's breaking something.
- MacBook Air M2 16GB / 512GB
- MacBook Pro 16" i9 2.4Ghz 32GB / 1TB
- MacBook Pro 15" i7 2.9Ghz 16GB / 512GB
- iMac i5 3.2Ghz 1TB
- G4 Cube 500Mhz / Shelf display unit / Museum display
     
   
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