what's up guys today we're going to set up a dual monitor kvm with an m1 macbook and a windows
desktop pc if any of this moves too fast check out our library of videos especially the one on how to
choose a dual monitor kvm so to start we need to understand how we chose this kvm model for this
situation all TESmart dual monitor kvms require three connections from each computer. HDMI cannot
be split and extended so the kvm is gonna need one connection for each monitor and then a data
connection for the usb devices when choosing a kvm we start by writing out the components in their
ports when doing this keep in mind that the signal flows from the computers to the kvm and then
to the monitors understanding this flow is very imperative if you require adapters for your setup
we're going to connect the m1 macbook into pc1 of the kvm the m1 supports only one external monitor
but we can get around this by using a docking station with display link most modern laptops
typically do not need a dock because they have HDMI and Thunderbolt ports but for this particular
laptop we need a dock because of the m1 limitation the dock has one HDMI and two Display port outputs
the desktop has a graphics card with one HDMI and three Display port outputs and since we always
want to reduce the number of adapters the correct kvm for today's setup is the HDK model it requires
an HDMI Displayport and USB connection from each computer and it has two HDMI outputs one for the
left monitor and one for the right monitor when connecting these monitors we suggest to always
use display one to the left and display two to the right display one gets a signal from the display
for input and display two gets a signal from the HDMI input this makes it really easy to trace back
any issues if you come across one the setup today is going to include a wacom tablet a logitech
webcam and a set of stereo speakers the kvm only has one standard USB port so we're going to use an
Amazon powered USB hub to connect all of these to the kvm all right let's go ahead and set this up
all right we're in the back of our desk here and we're going to set up the desktop computer
and what you want to notice here is we have a graphics card and if you have a graphics card
it's going to disable your motherboard's onboard graphics which are these up here
so when you connect the kvm's video ports you want to be your graphics card only
so we're going to go here and plug in our Display port and now our HDMI and then the
USB port into the motherboard then we're going to come over here to the kvm we're going to do HDMI
Display port and then UDB now we're going to plug in our mouse and keyboard into the
emulated mouse and keyboard ports these ports have specific programming to allow the mouse
and keyboard to be instantly available but regular USB devices will not work in these
they will only work in the usb 2.0 port which has this little squiggly line down here all
right let's go to the front of our desk and let's turn on the kvm and set up our windows desktop
and turn it on and here you can see that number two is already sele cted
and we have online two which means the desktop is getting a data connection with the kvm now the
first time you set it up you may see some flashing while all the handshakes are being resolved
usually once this is done after the first time you're going to switch back and forth much faster
okay now we have this up if you aren't able to move the mouse between the monitors then you
will need to rearrange the monitors within your operating system it's very easy to do we'll show
you how to do that you're going to right click on your windows desktop and click display settings
then here you click identify and you can see the number on your monitors
and you can move them around in the order that they need to be also on the same page you can make
a certain monitor your main display which is where the operations and the applications are going to
open up and where your taskbar and icons are going to appear so we do that by clicking this box down
here which is make this my main display then we save that and we close that and then you're all
set up if you have other issues like a jumpy mouse or repeating characters make sure to check out a
troubleshooting video that shows how to resolve most of these hiccups that other users encounter
as we mentioned earlier apple's m1 macbook will support only one external monitor so even though
we have two thunderbolt ports right here only one of those is going to work at a time for video
we get around this limitation by using a docking station with display link technology
the only downside to display link is that the drivers are not going to unstall automatically
so we're going to have to download those but we'll go through that process with you today
don't worry we typically recommend dell universal docs with most installations
whether for pc or for mac and we have those linked on our tested and approved adapter page
now let's go to the back of the table let's connect everything really quick
to save time we've already plugged in the dell dock to power and we connected the usb
connection to the macbook pro we did have to pick up a different cable than what came with the dock
and we've linked that below in the description so here we're going to plug in the display port
and then now the hdmi and then finally the usb then we're going to run our cables over
we're going to plug them into pc1 which is going to be oops grab the wrong one there
hdmi display port and the usb now let's go to the front of our desk and let's set up the
operating system with our kvm so the first thing we want to do is switch over to
input 1 and display link was already running so it took a little bit of magic away i'm just going to
quit it really quick so i can show you guys how we set this up so normally when you first turn this
on it's going to look like this with the laptop working but the external monitors are not working
and you need to download the display link drivers to do this i launch safari i type
in apple m1 display link drivers and then you're going to come to this page right here by synaptics
you'll download the application here and just follow all the prompts and then you're going to
run the application i already have it installed to save time so we're going to click the display
link manager and we're going to give it about five seconds here let the application run recognize the
monitors and all of a sudden you're going to have the external monitors working no problem one very
very important note though is that once you do have display link running you want to come up here
to the display link icon and you're going to check box this launch app automatically after logging in
if you don't do that you're going to have to launch the display link manager every time you
want to use the mac similar to the windows desktop if you can't move your mouse from left to right
then you want to come up here to the apple icon and click system preferences displays
then you click this arrangement tab and now you can move the windows around
as you see fit so they look like your monitors and you can move the mouse as you normally would
one thing that we have noticed that mac os has a lot less display options than what windows has
so we just recommend sticking with what our mac os recommends you can make some changes but you're
not going to find the same flexibility you would with a windows pc oh one final note the m1 setup
you can close the laptop and you can use the m1 just fine as long as you have power but if the m1
goes to sleep you cannot wake it up with a mouse and keyboard that you normally would use you have
to open up the lid and use the onboard trackpad and the mouse if anybody knows a workaround for
this please do us a favor and let us know in the comments we'd really appreciate it thanks
the last set of components that we need to set up today is our shared usb devices since
the kvm has only one usb port we highly highly recommend to use a powered usb hub there just
isn't enough voltage to power multiple components without supplementing the power
the usb 2.0 port is a direct pass-through from your devices to your computers but because a kvm
is a switch only the computer that is selected on the kvm will be allowed to use those devices
when going from one pc to another the devices will disconnect and then reconnect to the new
one this is a critical point if you're a mac user because any external hard drives plugged into
the kvm are going to need to be ejected before switching inputs so let's go ahead the back of
our desk and let's go and finish this setup today to save a little time we've already ran power to
the usb hub it's very important that you power the hub first and then you connect it to the kvm
now we can grab our wacom tablet and then we can grab our webcam and the speakers that we're going
to use today they actually are powered by usb but the audio is transmitted over this analog plug so
we're going to power them here and then we're going to plug in the
audio to the headphone jack now let's go ahead and set up our operating systems with these devices
so here we got mac open already let's go ahead and launch facetime
so facetime is launched here here's our webcam that's working just fine
now we come over here to the options menu and then we can click sound and here we're going to
want to select dell usb audio it's dell usb audio because we're going through this docking station
it may look like the name of your monitor if you're not using a dock and if you can't tell
which one it should be just try them all it's going to be one of those so let's go ahead here
and test our speakers let's just play a video yep our speakers are working for you no problem
all right let's go ahead and switch over to our windows pc
now on windows here we're just going to open up zoom we're going to go to
our settings here's video yep they're right here we're good there and let's do the audio
by coming down here to lower right hand corner and now we're going to select one of the options
which looks like our monitor remove the cursor nothing is happening so this is a situation where
you're going to want to try more outputs let's try the other monitor
there we go now our audio is working here on our windows pc again if it's not clear
for your situation just try them all now the last thing we want to test out is our tablet so let's
open up our application here and let's see yep tablet is working no problem at all
all right one last note that we want to make about shared devices is that the kvm does not have
internal bluetooth so bluetooth devices will not connect directly to the kvm they're going to have
to connect to a computer which is going to bypass the kvm this is fine but the kvm will not be able
to share those devices with your other computer this applies to things like bluetooth headsets
apple's magic keyboard and mouse and bluetooth speakers alright that's it for today leave us
a comment if anything wasn't clear or open a support ticket on buytesmart.com for personalized
recommendations if you want to learn more to the left is how to choose a dual monitor kvm
and to the right is how to set up a dual monitor kvm when two laptops thanks and have a good day