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Surface Pro 9 with 5G - Dual Monitors with Surface dock

Anonymous
2023-09-21T21:11:36+00:00

I'm helping a friend configure a new Surface Pro 9 with 5G and we bought a Surface Thunderbolt™ 4 Dock but we're having trouble getting it to run two connected external monitors. It'll only fure up one at a time. There's nothing to suggest this shouldn't work but then I found one page saying that 5G version of the Surface Pro 9 could only support one external monitor via the Thunderbolt 4 dock. That sounds bonkers. Is it true? Especially since I then read it would run two monitors if we went back to a Surface 2 dock.

Any knowledge on this would really help!

Thanks

Simon

Surface | Surface Pro | Display and screen

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  1. Anonymous
    2023-09-28T06:40:44+00:00

    So as per DomFriant's post, what I've discovered it that because the Surface Thunderbolt™ 4 Dock has a USB4 / Thunderbolt wire, but the Surface Pro 9 5G's ports are only USB-C, you can only run one screen off that Dock (unless you Daisy Chain). No idea why Microsoft have done this to the 5G model. Our solution was to buy a Surface 2 dock and that works fine for two screens. Microsoft should make it all much clearer at the time of purchase.

    Thanks

    Simon

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  2. Anonymous
    2023-09-26T14:43:52+00:00

    I was curious about this as I didn't think the Pro 9 5G had Thunderbolt so am kind of surprised it works at all, but I guess it can also work as standard USB-C?

    Anyway I was looking at the dock page on the Microsoft store, and found this note at the bottom:

    [5] Surface Pro 9 5G with Surface Thunderbolt™ 4 Dock can support two 4K monitors when monitors are compatible and connected through daisy chain. 

    Based on that, it seems you can use two monitors, but only if you daisy chain them off one port? Not sure about the "compatible" part. Maybe that means your monitor has to have both an in and out port?

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  3. Anonymous
    2023-09-26T04:27:55+00:00

    Hi SimonVirgo!

    Thanks for getting back to us and apologies for the delayed response as I have been out of office.

    Could you please send us a photo of how your screen looks like and the ports of your Surface Thunderbolt for us to have a further check on it.

    Regards,

    RodelioP.

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  4. Anonymous
    2023-09-22T06:33:53+00:00

    Thank you

    To your points:

    All the firmware and OS etc is up to date.

    We did the disconnect / reconnect. When you say try different cables, do you mean in terms of quality?

    You said "1. Make sure that both monitors are connected to the dock using the correct ports. The Surface Thunderbolt™ 4 Dock has two HDMI 2.0 ports andtwo DisplayPort 1.4 ports, so you can use any combination of these ports to connect your monitors". but that's not quite right. There are two ports for monitors right which look like USB-C but are in fact Thunderbolt4/USB4. Is that right?

    Are there any cable types, resolution settings or refresh rates we should check?

    Thanks

    Simon

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  5. Anonymous
    2023-09-21T23:22:52+00:00

    Hi SimonVirgo!

    Thanks for reaching Microsoft Community. We're here to help and let's work on this together.

    The Surface Pro 9 with 5G should be able to support dual monitors with the Surface Thunderbolt™ 4 Dock. However, there are a few things you can check to ensure that the setup is correct:

    1. Make sure that both monitors are connected to the dock using the correct ports. The Surface Thunderbolt™ 4 Dock has two HDMI 2.0 ports and two DisplayPort 1.4 ports, so you can use any combination of these ports to connect your monitors.
    2. Check that the monitors are turned on and set to the correct input source.
    3. Make sure that the Surface Pro 9 is up to date with the latest firmware and drivers. You can check for updates by going to Settings > Update & Security > Windows Update.
    4. Try disconnecting and reconnecting the monitors to the dock, or try using different cables to connect the monitors.

    Please let us know how it goes. We look forward to hearing from you.

    Greetings,

    RodelioP.

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