Previously, I had written that one of the main reasons not to buy the Mac Studio is because it only features an HDMI 2.0 port. Along with MacOS limitations that prevent the Thunderbolt 4 ports from being used successfully with HDMI adapters to display anything higher than 60Hz at 4K, that made it not suitable for folks like myself who use an LG OLED TV, which can run 120Hz at 4K resolution, but only has HDMI ports since it is a TV.
Today, Apple announced the new MacBook Pro with M2 Pro and Max chips, as well as the new Mac mini with M2 and M2 Pro chips. The biggest limiting factor, the HDMI 2.0 port, from the M1 versions of these computers may finally be addressed, as these new M2 Pro or Max devices (NOT including the base M2 Mac mini) should finally have HDMI 2.1.
Indeed, on the tech specs pages of the MacBook Pro and Mac mini says this under the M2 Pro and M2 Max sections:
One external display supported at 8K resolution at 60Hz or one external display at 4K resolution at 240Hz over HDMI
In typical Apple fashion, they don’t actually list “HDMI 2.1” anywhere on the page, but just the supported capabilities.
Since these computers are not yet out, it still remains to be tested if it can indeed properly support 120Hz 4K with HDR turned on. However, I will provide an update once I have done some testing myself and seen what others have reported as well.
Yes, that means I’ve finally ordered a MacBook Pro 14″ since this HDMI limitation has finally, hopefully, been resolved. Stay tuned to learn more.
