Apple has officially expanded support for 4K displays and Ultra HD TVs, as well as Dell’s new UP2715K 27-inch 5K monitor. The company updated its support page on April 10 to reflect these changes, which also align with the release of its OS X 10.10.3 update.
In the past, Apple had only officially supported certain Multi-Stream Transport displays at a refresh rate of 60Hz, according to 9to5mac. Now, the company says that “most single-stream 4K (3840×2160) displays” will be supported at 60Hz.
In short, this means that there will be more support available for budget-friendly 4K displays that don’t have DisplayPort’s Multi-Stream Transport feature.
The Macs that will support Single-Stream displays with a 60Hz refresh rate include the following:
- MacBook Pro (Retina, 13-inch, Early 2015)
- MacBook Pro (Retina, 15-inch, Mid 2014)
- Mac Pro (Late 2013)
- iMac (27-inch, Late 2013 and later)
- Mac mini (Late 2014)
- MacBook Air (Early 2015)
- MacBook (Retina, 12-inch, Early 2015)
Apple’s new 12-inch MacBook will support displays with a resolution of 3840×2160 at 30 Hz or 4096×2160 at 24 Hz over HDMI.
Dell enthusiasts may have been the most surprised by Apple’s announcement, based on its inclusion of the UP2715K monitor. The 27-inch display monitor, which debuted in 2014, is currently being sold by Dell for $2,500. Some of its most striking features include its more than 14 million pixels, a 5120×2880 Ultra HD resolution, and 100 percent sRGB coverage. With OS X Yosemite 10.10.3 or later, the Dell’s 5K display is supported by the Mac Pro (late 2013) and iMac (Retina 5K, 27-inch, late 2014).
That being said, Apple already has its own 5K display on the iMac, boasting 14.7 million pixels. Expanding coverage for Dell will simply give Mac users more monitor connectivity options.
Apple is expected to debut 8K displays at some point in 2016, according to 9to5mac. The Video Electronics Standards Association has announced Embedded DisplayPort 1.4a. This uses a new compression standard to support higher resolution panels with faster refresh rates. In turn, the path has been paved for monitors that feature resolutions up to 8K.
