Recently, I got a mac laptop at work, which is sup[er sweet, but I wanted to hook it up to a real monitor, keyboard and mouse. All very easy things to do. The problem I had was that the laptop was acting as the primary monitor. Every application that I drug over to the secondary monitor worked great, but the application tool bar was still on the laptop.. annoying.
I did a quick Google search to see if there was a solution to the problem. There was, and it’s dead simple to put into action.
Connect the external monitor
- Start up the “System Preferences” app
- Click on “Display Preferences”
- Within Display Preferences, choose Arrangement. You should see two blue squares that represent each display, main and secondary. On the main display you’ll notice a bar along the top.
- Click and drag this bar from the Main Display to the Secondary Display.
- Close Display Preferences
- That’s it!
{ 12 comments… read them below or add one }
Hy Josh
I think this is what Im looking for but I would like to be sure. Im working with Final Cut Pro and will like to have an external monitor for the interface of FCP but to see the preview at the MacBook Pro display. If I understand well i will need to drag the bar to the secondary display (the external one), yes?
Thank in advance for your answer
Josef
Yup, just drag the bar to the external display and it will become the primary monitor. Let me know if it works out for you.
Hi Josh,
I have the same LG display, however when I drag the bar over, everything seems be zoomed and expanded in including Safari. How did you get everything to mirror so perfectly?
Hi Josh,
Nice trick. It worked perfectly for me.
Eric,
Try resetting the resolution again. For me the taskbar was all bloated. Changed the resolution twice to 1920×1080/60Hz. Then the display works fine ….
- Tony
hey, thanks so much. simple and so cool!
Hi Josh, Are you happy with the LG resolution and contrast. I just bought a 23”samsung px2370 LED and the text in my word docs look a little fuzzy. Just wondering if the LG would be a better choice. I don’t work on photography or videos, just word and excel mainly. I appreaciate your input. ~Sharon
@sharon,
I also had this problem with the Samsung PX2370, and I know others have it too. As a background, I had an adapter from mini displayport to HDMI, and I set the resolution settings to 1080p (in System Preferences), but then I had to underscan to get it to fit (it was blurry with or without underscan).
SOLUTION: It turned out to be a pretty easy fix. Just change the aspect ratio on the monitor (Menu->Size & Position->Image Size) to “Screen Fit” instead of 16:9. Mine looks beautiful now.
Hopefully this helps!
Worked perfectly, sometimes we all fail to see the most simple answers in life.
Thank you for the tip, this has been so frustrating for such a long time.
Thank you so much! Why do things need to be so simple?? I feel like such an idiot!
Awesome! So simple. Much easier than awkwardly dragging everything!
Thank you dude! I had the same problem, never thought of dragging! You’ve helped me for my year old problem!!!
I got yesterday full hd dell and was wondering what to do
Perfect, thank you!