macOS 10.15 Catalina bring’s a new feature called Sidecar, which allows Mac users to turn their iPad into a second monitor. However, at least in the first beta, the feature is limited to a small selection of newer Macs.
The new feature was debuted on Monday during Apple’s WWDC 2019 keynote address. The feature both extends the Mac’s display to the iPad, and allows using the iPad as a mirrored display or a second screen, it can also be used as a graphics tablet when an Apple Pencil is thrown into the mix.
On Wednesday, developer Steve Trougton-Smith posted to Twitter a list of devices that the new feature will work on, as well as a list of hardware it will not work on.
https://twitter.com/stroughtonsmith/status/1136413491462594560
Troughton-Smith says Sidecar supports the 27-inch iMac from Late 2015, the 2016 MacBook Pro, 2018 Mac mini, the new Mac Pro, the 2018 MacBook Air, the Early 216 MacBook and newer models of each device.
Troughton-Smith notes there is a terminal command that is supposed to enable it on earlier Macs running the beta, but it is not guaranteed to work. The command is as follows:
defaults write com.apple.sidecar.display allowAllDevices -bool YES
It isn’t clear why Apple is limiting Sidecar availability to newer Macs, or if it will expand availability in later betas and the final version. We’ll keep you posted.
