L1 KVM + M1 MacBook + Odyssey Neo G9

Hey folks!

Reaching out as I don’t know what else to do.

I have a Samsung Odyssey Neo G9 on one end. Connected to the L1 KVM, on the other end, I have:

  • MacBook M1 Max
  • MacBook M1 Pro
  • 3080 Ti

Updated the monitor’s firmware to the latest version. The PC that’s plugged in on port 3 drives the display in DP 1.4 mode with whatever cable I throw at it. The MacBooks are a whole other story. When either of them is driving the display, it’ll work for a few seconds, then start flickering, and it finally goes black. Somehow it seems to be losing connection with the monitor because if I dig deep into Console.app I get this, which suggests the connection is getting cut off somehow:

Display 4 current mode (0 x 0) [0 0], preferred mode (0 x 0) [0 0]

Direct connection to the monitor with most USB-C cables works just fine.

I’ve tried most permutations of the following:

  • Bi-directional USB-C to DP 1.4 Club3D cable (works direct)
  • USB-C to DP 1.4 CableMatters cable (works direct)
  • USB-C to DP 1.4 CableMatters adapter (don’t buy this for Apple hardware)
  • Samsung’s original DP to DP cable
  • Club3D DP to DP 1.4 cable

I’m out a few hundred dollars and out of ideas. Has anyone seen this happen? Any tips?

Please @wendell Wan, you’re my only hope.

Reaching out as I don’t know what else to do.

The product page on the store has my email address? :wink:

that message on the mac means its dp phy has given up. You might be able to get it back by rebooting the mac.

Moshi is the best brand of usbc to dp but others have had success with club3d usbc to dp.

The club3d dp to dp cable out of the kvm into the g9, is that 3 foot? if not you might try fibbr brand fiber optic cables. The 2m and longer cables from that is fine and lower loss than club3d.

“but the cable works fine by itself” so this is the wrong way to think about it.

“rightsholders” want to know about anything that could eavesdrop on the DP bus so repeaters tend to show up in the DP topology. The kvm’s design goal is to be invisible. How to think of it then? One long analog signal corridor from the gpu to the kvm and beyond, through the next cable, to the monitor. So your usb c to dp cable has to have high enough SNR to put out a signal not just to a monitor 1 inch away but through several feet of copper cable.

The g9 is particularly picky.

You might be able to enable dsc/240hz on the neo g9? That might possibly work with the macs? macs do have fleeting support for dsc in some scenarios because they painted themselves into a corner – some of their highest end displays don’t even work reliably without it because the port out of the laptop barely works.

Anyway, other customers have a similar setup and it works. It is possible its something with the kvm, you can mail it in and I can test it with the macs and odyssey g9 that are here, but there is variation from device to device so that’s not a guarantee.

I am hoping that telling you that combinations such as cable A plus cable B hinge on it working/not working because the kvm doesn’t have a repeater in it as a design goal and that might be the secret to it working.

The other secret to it working is that if you had a marginal cable on the other side of the usbc cable it will remember and not retrain very hard. Hence rebooting the mac and also unplugging the adapter from both ends since it saps power from the bus. Doesn’t hurt to power cycle the KVM, too.

Yes, you are literally rebooting a cable in some scenarios like usbc to dp. There’s processing silicon in there too! Also, this sounds stupid, but right side up usbc is not the same as upside down usbc. Was playing with a moshi cable today that worked better “logo up” than “logo down” I kid you not.

Moshi is a better brand than club3d for the dp 1.4 to usbc adapter, and you may require fiberoptic low-loss cabling from the kvm to the display in order to work with the mac sadness.

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Thank you for the in-depth response.

I pulled the trigger on the FIBBR cable, although that’ll be a while before it gets in. For the Moshi cable, is the one from moshi dot com (sorry, apparently I can’t use links) the one I want? Will it drive the G9? It doesn’t mention a DP version, so I’m a bit reluctant to get it.

The kvm faq here also has lots of info and aome video of a sinilar g9 video and links here and there.

So… bad news. I got the cables, and hooked them up, and still experiencing the same issue.

Any other ideas?

What cables are going where? Is it the mac or pc or both?

Moshi USB C goes from the mac to the KVM. FIBBR goes from the KVM to the G9.

The pc is ok but not the mac? What cables is the pc using?

The PC has just an off-the-shelf CableMatters cable I got from Amazon. ASIN B08637G66P if you’re curious. It works flawlessly, and it’s just the Mac.

If there is any diagnostic information you’d like to grab, I’d be happy to accommodate – even if you wanted to do a remote control session so you could poke around.

Have you tried flip flopping which machine is in whst port? What refresh are you trying on the mac?

Is the g9 in 120 or 240hz mode?

Have you tried flip flopping which machine is in whst port?

I haven’t, but I should try.

What refresh are you trying on the mac?

I’ve tried 60 and 120hz. With and without HDR.

Is the g9 in 120 or 240hz mode?

240hz, I was trying to force DSC, but the macs don’t offer that as an option.

I just realized I hadn’t mentioned this before, but this all works perfectly when the monitor is in DP 1.2 mode. It’s when I flip it to DP 1.4 that it starts losing its shit.

And yoube got the latest g9 firmware on too? Or what version is on the display?

Yeah… macs dont like dsc unless you hsve the lg monitor thst requires it

Definitely have firmware v1011 installed on it.

well, we can swap the kvm and see what it does, but it may be worth swapping which thing is on what input, too.

I’d also try 120hz then power cycle the monitor (pop power cord, wait a min, do the same for the kvm, then put it back).

The mac not supporting dsc can poison the well with the g9. There was a bug a few firmwares ago where once it does dsc it NEVER goes out of dsc. that’s a problem if you toggle between a pc w/dsc and one w/out. That was fixed in 1008 but I’m not sure I’ve tested for that regression with 1011.

Wendell

Would the fact that it’s a 2 DP port KVM but only one is connected do something here too?

you should try hooking up your macs through dock with display port cables, works flawlessly for me, i tried usb-c to display port cable to connect my mac to l1kvm, had similar issues.

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Is there a specific one you recommend?

Caldigit. Wont matter thst only one input is used

Honestly, I’d like to resolve this with the KVM. Spending more money to get 2 docks is prohibitive at this point.

@wendell would you be willing to hop on a call and live debug with me?

You can email me wendell at level1techs.com and we can do an RMA. I can test your kvm here with a moshi cable and we can go from there.

I am not sure why we would need two docks? at this point we have:

desktop pc working fine
mac with moshi cable not working fine
the fibbr cable is between the kvm and the g9?

(it would make sense if both macs with the same cable is doing the same thing). And this is with the g9. Do you have the g9 configured for 120hz or 240hz? And you are on firmware v1011?