Hi
I was hoping that you people can help me find out if any of these two setups will work.

I'm going to get an ultra wide monitor with 3440x1440 resolution. It will probably be the AOC AGON AG352UCG. This monitor have connection for one DisplayPort and one HDMI.

For this monitor I'm going to connector both my gaming PC and a Mac Mini(for media server).
The PC is going to use the DisplayPort so that i can get 100Hz, but the Mac Mini will use the HDMI.

So, what I'm thinking is the Mac Mini late 2012 or late 2014. I have read that the late 2012 model only support this resolution if I use the thunderbolt because the HDMI does can't reach 3440x1440.
But, is it possible to get 3440x1440 resolution if I use the thunderbolt and connect it to the Belkin Thunderbolt Express Dock 2, and then connect the dock to the monitor with a HDMI cable?

If this is 100% guaranteed to not work, I will then have to go with the late 2014 model.
Can I then use 3440x1440 resolution with the HDMI?

netrom2211 said:

Can I then use 3440x1440 resolution with the HDMI?

Yes at 50Hz.

Had mine on an LG 34UM95 Thunderbolt. Had to run at 50Hz. It will run at 60Hz, but it does weird things. Occasionally did weird things at 50Hz as well, but not very often.

I still have the LG, just don’t have the Mini on it anymore. It’s a great monitor size. Great for multi tasking. Me and my wife even have our own “sides”, we keep our apps on either side of the screen. We can each leave up what we are doing and the other person still has room to do stuff.

ActionableMango said:

Yes at 50Hz.

Hey thanks for that info! I had in mind that I’d need to connect via TB for 3440x1440 and got a garbled screen in the lower 20%, despite 50Hz and even though it’s an official resolution offered directly by OSX (10.11), no hack. Will try HDMI tomorrow.

Neodym said:

Hey thanks for that info! I had in mind that I’d need to connect via TB for 3440x1440 and got a garbled screen in the lower 20%, despite 50Hz and even though it’s an official resolution offered directly by OSX (10.11), no hack. Will try HDMI tomorrow.

Well, your monitor might not support it even if the Mini does. I've seen several 1440p monitors that only do 1080p on the HDMI ports.

Or it might be like my 3440x1440 monitor, where one of the HDMI ports will support 3440x1440 but the other HDMI port only supports 1080p. I wonder how many pennies that saved Dell, and how much aggravation it has caused end users.

Check your monitor manual.

Soo - the good news: my monitor does support 3440x1440 on both HDMI ports. The bad news: Via HDMI the mini only supports 30Hz in that resolution. Plus - I still see the garbled parts (2048x858 as next-lower res is fine). Not sure if the Ram simply overheats or if it is faulty (again - had it already exchanged by the manufacturer, don't know which one right now).

I remember that I could run the full res without problems for some time. Perhaps there was some settings change with a relatively recent OS X update (running 10.11.6) taking care of Meltdown/Spectre, which now leads to overheating in higher resolutions?

Will also run a memory test, but I'm not sure if it's worth spending another 150-200€ for a new set of Ram, when a new mini could be revealed this year. Perhaps I should sell it now that I still get some decent money for it (Late 2012 [email protected]). Recently it's anyway merely more than a backup server for the iDevices, as I found myself using other devices over the mini for daily duties. And the backup duties could be solved with a different setup. *ponders*

Edith reminds me that via TB I can also get 2560x1080 without garbled parts on screen.

I have a late 2012 Mac Mini (2.6 GHz Quad-Core Intel Core i7, 16GB, Intel HD 4000 1536 MB, 1xThunderbolt, 1xHDMI)

I use an LG34UM95 Ultrawide display running at 3440x1440, 50Hz connected via Thunderbolt. It works perfectly.

Is there a way to add another LG34UM95? I would like a 4 screen setup over the two displays...

Thanks in advance to anyone who can offer help on this!

SilverWinterSky said:

Is there a way to add another LG34UM95? I would like a 4 screen setup over the two displays...

As TB1/2 is not officially supported (anymore) for eGPU’s, a USB-to-DisplayPort adapter is probably your best bet.

Thank you - I am off to investigate that now...!

SilverWinterSky said:

I use an LG34UM95 Ultrawide display running at 3440x1440, 50Hz connected via Thunderbolt. It works perfectly.

interesting. The official specs only mention support up to 2560 x 1600.

Runs at 50Hz. Rock solid since the day I bought it...

Looks like the USB-to-DisplayPort adapter suggested above may work for what I want to do. I'm going to give it a try, and will report back here in a couple of weeks. Thank you Neodym!

Looks like Apple is acknowledging this issue.

MacCheetah3 said:

interesting. The official specs only mention support up to 2560 x 1600.

Mac mini (Late 2012) - Technical Specifications

Apple obviously never bothered to update the specs, but officially added the UW resolution @50Hz to the monitor resolution list in a later OS X/macOS.

In earlier OSX versions you had to manually create it via e.g. ScreenResX, hence the entry in the official specs.