“I even have an old Apple monitor,” several readers write each week. “How can I hook it up?” We’ve written some art articles about connecting each of the generations of Apple monitors, from the DVI-based fashions via DisplayPort-best configurations and completing with the closing era, which relied on Thunderbolt 2: (With a Thunderbolt display and a Thunderbolt three-prepared Macintosh, you want a Thunderbolt 2 to Thunderbolt 3 adapter and nothing else.) Despite this small ocean of specific advice, it appears like more and more readers’ queries come with the proviso that they’ve already studied and attempted one of the above articles—and it didn’t make paintings.
I suspect this arises from one in all numerous motives. The Apple monitors are all getting older; a few are a decade or more old, and a given unit might fail. Many groups make DVI and DisplayPort adapters, and compatibility isn’t assured, especially in cases where you’re plugging or maybe three together in a series. And now and then, it’s only a mystery: One man or woman can get a given display and adapters to paintings flawlessly with a specific version and year of Mac, and another man or woman cannot.
The appropriate news is that new, modest-sized to mid-sized video display units of the size that Apple used to offer for several hundred to heaps of bucks now start on the $100 level. They’re sharper, brighter, extra reliable, and, pleasant of all, new. While these models usually lack USB-C (and none of the much less-highly-priced ones have Thunderbolt 3), you may use a simple adapter that passes through video statistics rather than appearing the hints wanted from older generations to work with newer ones. These simple adapters commonly cost from $20 to $30 to paintings with HDMI or complete-sized DisplayPort plugs and have a USB-C connector on the other hand.
The different precise information is that if you have a great-situation Apple show, there’s a market for such units, and most of the tens of millions of people are using older Macs. You don’t need to push it into a recycling or disassembly waste stream. Instead, promote the screen you need to a person who can plug it in and use the proceeds to shop for one compatible or easily adaptable with the Mac you now own.
