I purchased 2 x Plugable UGA-2K-A USB 2.0 adapters to run two additional monitors on my new 2011 Macbook Pro 15". I have a primary display running over thunderbolt/display port connector (for faster video), and that display offers “Rotation” option. The two monitors (20" and 24") which I’m running over UGA-2K-A do not offer the “Rotation” option under Displays menu.
I have installed the latest available drivers from DisplayLink (1.6 - 27 April 2011), and have tried their suggestion (http://www.displaylink.com/support/ti…) to use Command+Option keys when selecting Displays without success.
The adapters work fine in landscape layout, and quality is good. Even running them through Plugable 7-port USB hub works great. But I need to be able to rotate the monitors to Portrait layout. Any help would be greatly appreciated!
I installed the 1.7 beta 2 drivers as recommended, and checked the display settings. Still seeing the same issue - no Rotation menu. I’m able to rotate the primary monitor which is running over display port, but unable to rotate monitor which is running via Plugable DisplayLink USB adapter.
Also, I don’t know if it’s expected behavior, but I’m unable to take screen shots on USB-connected monitors. I had to move the display menus in previous comment over to the primary monitor, which is not connected via USB, and only then did the screenshots come out.
I’m sorry, this rotation limitation is a known issue on DisplayLink’s 1.7 driver right now.
Rotation support has a history on the Mac. It was broken by the 10.6.3 update from Apple, fixed in DisplayLink’s 1.6b2 driver, and now appears to be broken in DisplayLink’s 1.7 series which has major changes for OS X Lion compatibility.
On our side, one workaround that may be worth trying (as long as you’re not yet running Lion) is to uninstall your current DisplayLink driver (see the uninstall instructions of http://displaylinkmanuals.s3.amazonaw… )
And instead of installing the latest beta (1.7 b1 or b2), instead install the 1.6 released driver (from the same location http://displaylink.com/support/mac_do… ).
Please let us know if we can help in any more direct way for you. We don’t ever want customers of our product stuck with something that isn’t working for them.
I have tried both 1.6 and 1.7b2 drivers with no luck. Still not seeing rotation option for USB displays. I guess at this point I can wait for an updated version of the driver to be released which hopefully fixes this issue?
I have the same issue with not seeing the rotation option, this only happens when the monitors are plugged into the DisplayLink USB 2.0 docking station. Any ideas?
This function on Mac is not available for any USB attached graphics device right now. We’re hopeful that a future driver update from DisplayLink (or OS update from Apple) will bring rotation back, but we don’t yet have a date certain.
We understand this is frustrating - thanks for your patience and feel free to ping here anytime for any updates!
Bernie
But another developer sitting next to me has 2 monitors plugged into USB on his iMac and he has rotation option on both monitors, what’s the difference? He is on OSX X 10.6.7.
This is definitely a software issue, not hardware (e.g. if you took the USB hardware from the working machine, and plugged it into yours, your machine’s behavior wouldn’t change). Let’s see if we can figure out a solution.
DisplayLink has a knowledge base article covering the break in rotate that happened with Apple’s 10.6.3. update. Sasha reported it didn’t help him, but perhaps it’s because of something specific to his case. Can you give it a quick try? Here’s the steps: http://www.displaylink.com/support/ti…
If this doesn’t work, the next step will be to grab some more detailed info with DisplayLink’s support tool (http://plugable.com/support/displayli… ). This, especially if we can get info from both the succeeding/failing machines, should give us enough info to figure out the difference. Could you email these logs to our support@plugable.com line?
I’m sorry, this is frustrating. Thanks for your patience!
Bernie
I upgraded to Mac OS X 10.7 Lion today. After playing with the display settings, the results looked the same.
And then I tried something different with the Command+Option keys. Instead of holding them only when clicking on “Displays” menu item in System Preferences, I tried holding down Command+Option while opening Systems Preferences and continued to hold them down as I opened the “Displays” menu item. And finally, I was able to see the rotation options!!!
I noticed that rotation option persists if you change the rotation on your monitor, but require Command+Option pressed to bring them back if you reverted back to standard layout. And rotation settings persists if you sleep or restart the machine.
Happy that it finally works! Now I’m putting both of my Plugable display adapters to good use! Thanks for all the help.
