3 External Monitor with Macbook Pro lagging problem

[Evaneezersqueezer]

Originally Posted by brdmyldz

Hi,

My setup is,
Macbook Pro 15" 2016 ( https://imgur.com/a/tiIHgUw )
ASUS VG27AQ 27" 60Hz (using HDMI -> HDMI cable) [QHD]
2x ASUS VA24DQ 23.8” 75 Hz (using DP -> HDMI cable) [FHD] (one is vertical)
Dell D6000 Dock with DisplayLink Support
Setup Picture: https://imgur.com/a/0Ole7Cg

I got the D6000 a week or two ago and I have been facing some problems. There is some fps drop on the middle monitor(VG27AQ) and there are HUGE fps drops on monitor on the right (one of VA24DQ that I use vertical).

For example, I was just talking to my friend on facetime using my macbook and I was mainly using the vertical monitor since the webcam is on that monitor so I put the facetime window on the right monitor to make eye contact with her. There wasn't any other program on during this happening. The monitor was laggy from the beginning of the video call. Interestingly my camera input that was going to her was also very laggy according to her which I believe might be due to dock performance limitation. And at some point the monitor (not the camera input) got completely frozen. Closing the displaylink app and restarting it fixed the temporarily.

Another example, I was playing games on my main monitor using GeForce now. I could easily detect that the quality wasn't 60fps (there was couple fps spikes) and it was not due to GeForce now but rather the display itself (because my mouse was also lagging so the entire screen was lagging). I had my discord on the right screen and at some point, the display on the right (where the discord is) got completely frozen but I was still able to talk to my friends. Again, I had to restart displaylink app to fixed it in the end.

I tried to diagnose the problem. I have couple theories and a possible solution.
1. I think since the webcam is 1080p 30fps, and directly connected to the dock it self, it just decreasing the performance of DisplayLink automatically.
2. D6000 suppose to support 2x 4K 60HZ + 1x 4K 30 Hz according to their website but I'm only using 2x FHD 75 Hz + 1X QHD 60 Hz so I feel like there is something weird going on here.


Note 1: Problem continues if I decrease the side monitors to 75 Hz -> 60 Hz so I don't think it's related to that.
Note 2: I never observed any lag on the monitor on the left side even though it is exactly the same monitor as the left one and has the same connection. I don't think my monitor is broken because When I change the cabling from VG27AQ (HDMI->HDMI to DP->HDMI) and VA24DQ (DP->HDMI to HDMI->HDMI) the main lag problem translated into the main screen. And I used different cables too, so I believe it is connected to the D6000 performance limitation and displaylink.

My possible solution,

I bought D6000 because I wanted to use only 1 Thunderbolt 3 cable going into my Macbook Pro so it would look pretty clean and simple. Well from my research I realized that it is impossible to have a good quality display connection using single thunderbolt 3 port. I was thinking that I could return my D6000 and get a cheaper dock that has displaylink support for Dual Monitor which I would connect my side monitors to that and other usb/ethernet connections. And on top of that I was planning to get a thunderbolt 3 to HDMI cable for the main monitor (VG27AQ), so I would decrease the pressure on the dock and I would have ALT quality on my main monitor.

That bring one question on my mind. If I use displayLink on my two side monitors, when I connect my main monitor using Thunderbolt3 -> HDMI directly from the laptop as I described above, would the connection be ALT or DisplayLink because I would want that to be ALT connetion naturally. Also can I connect both the dock and the Thunderbolt3->HDMI cable on the right side of the laptop?

Let me know what you are thinking. Also let me know if you have any dock recommendations. I basically want 60 Hz support on all of the 3 monitors (2x FHD, 1x QHD) with the cleanest solution because I will plug/unplug my laptop many times in a day. I would appreciate any feedback and let me know if you need further information. Good day!

Hi,

Wondering if you can help because we have a similar setup. I have the Macbook Pro 2017 13 inch. I have 2 monitors connected to the D6000 with HDMI to DP and 1 monitor connected to the D6000 with HDMI to HDMI. When I plug the D6000 into the thunderbolt port on the Macbook, all of the screens work but the 3 external displays are all mirrored. Seems like the Mac is only detecting the D6000 input as 1 monitor, not 3. I have looked all over Displaylink software for a way to make each screen an external display but cannot find anything. Did you have this issue when you first set it up and if so, how did you fix it?

Thank you in advance.

[xavierr]

For your information, the new release (v1.6) seems to have fixed this problem

I installed it on december 22 and i have not had the above problems in the past two weeks.

[xavierr]

I spoke way too fast. Still having major performance issues when Sharing Screens on my Macbook Pro when using my multiple monitor setup.

I am more than willing to try to troubleshoot this with DisplayLink:
- I have tried many things (e.g. all my screens are in landscape -- no rotations - but I still have the issues)
- I have reached out to them many times.

Kate from DisplayLink replied to my posts once, but she never bothered again.

Please help.

Xavier