New clue on blank external display

streichbart · 01-10-2025, 12:07 AM

Hey all. As many others in this forum I also experience issues with my DisplayLink driven Docking station (Lenovo ThinkPad Hybrid USB-C with USB-A Dock) on my Macbook Pro 2019 (Intel). I haven't found a perfect solution yet, but would like to give it as a hint to the devs and a workaround for anyone having the same problems.

As many people, DisplayLink Manager claims to recognize my Display. It turns on automatically, as if receiving a signal but only shows a blank screen. Restarting the app or my computer won't help, as little as reinstalling the Software.

I noticed that the trouble started only recently after changing my setup a bit: I started to use the audio jack in the front panel of my docking station. And indeed: when I unplug the cable and restart the DisplayLink Manager everything works fine. I may then plug it in again and it still works works. However, when restarting the dock (shutting down electricity), I have to repeat this procedure, which is why I find it pretty finnicky.

Here's a bonus: on Apple Mail, I started to get problems with the view pane of an email around the same time. The email list shows fine and when I select one I can also read the sender and receiver infos etc. in the top bar. But the content appears as blank. I found several other posts about this behaviour on the internet.
Again, the unlikely solution is the audio cable. If I unplug it, even whith Mail open, it immediatly shows me the email's content. I have no idea why this is there should be a connection between these two problems but it is apparent. I wonder if anyone of you poor souls also experience issues with mail.

Maybe this can help you identify the problem within the DisplayLink software but since it is the Thinkpad Hardware that affects also other software (i.E. Apple Mail, don't ask me whyâ€¦) this could also be an error with the docking station (maybe the firmware?!).

01-10-2025, 12:07 AM	#1
streichbart Junior Member Join Date: Jan 2025 Posts: 1	New clue on blank external display Hey all. As many others in this forum I also experience issues with my DisplayLink driven Docking station (Lenovo ThinkPad Hybrid USB-C with USB-A Dock) on my Macbook Pro 2019 (Intel). I haven't found a perfect solution yet, but would like to give it as a hint to the devs and a workaround for anyone having the same problems. As many people, DisplayLink Manager claims to recognize my Display. It turns on automatically, as if receiving a signal but only shows a blank screen. Restarting the app or my computer won't help, as little as reinstalling the Software. I noticed that the trouble started only recently after changing my setup a bit: I started to use the audio jack in the front panel of my docking station. And indeed: when I unplug the cable and restart the DisplayLink Manager everything works fine. I may then plug it in again and it still works works. However, when restarting the dock (shutting down electricity), I have to repeat this procedure, which is why I find it pretty finnicky. Here's a bonus: on Apple Mail, I started to get problems with the view pane of an email around the same time. The email list shows fine and when I select one I can also read the sender and receiver infos etc. in the top bar. But the content appears as blank. I found several other posts about this behaviour on the internet. Again, the unlikely solution is the audio cable. If I unplug it, even whith Mail open, it immediatly shows me the email's content. I have no idea why this is there should be a connection between these two problems but it is apparent. I wonder if anyone of you poor souls also experience issues with mail. Maybe this can help you identify the problem within the DisplayLink software but since it is the Thinkpad Hardware that affects also other software (i.E. Apple Mail, don't ask me whyâ€¦) this could also be an error with the docking station (maybe the firmware?!).