Connect to MacBook Pro?

[Campbell1082]

What’s easiest way to connect the steam deck to a M1 MacBook Pro? I have USB C and HDMI - what other program do I need? TIA

[Minneyar]

When you say "connect," what do you mean? What are you trying to accomplish?

Both the Deck and a MacBook are USB hosts, not peripherals, so directly connecting the two with a USB-C cable won't do anything. Likewise, neither of them are a standalone display device, so connecting them with an HDMI cable also won't do anything.

[Man's Best Friend]

You can't do what you're planning on doing.
Not without additional hardware like an HDMI capture box.

[Minneyar]

If your goal is to use your laptop as a display device for the Deck (or to record video on it), you will also need:
1. A USB-C dock with HDMI output; it doesn't necessarily need to be the official Docking Station, you can get a dock off of Amazon for $35 that will do.
2. A USB-C video capture device with HDMI input; you can get one of these for around $20, just make sure it has Mac OS support and can handle whatever resolution you want to capture.
3. Software on your Mac that can connect to the input device and record video; there are lots of different programs that can do this, Open Broadcaster Software is free and very powerful.

Plug the dock into your Deck, the capture device into your laptop, connect the two with an HDMI cable, then start your video capture software and configure it to record from your device. Keep in mind that since you're going through an encoding and decoding process and not connected directly to a dedicated display device, the whole process will introduce a bit of input lag, and depending on the quality of your capture device and software configuration, it could range anywhere from being imperceptibly small to over a second of lag.

[Campbell1082]

Gotcha. Yeah I’m trying to connect to my MbP or my Apple display to make it easier to use mouse / keyboard. I have a Genki Shadowcast - which works fine with my Switch, but doesn’t seem to work with SD….guess I’ll keep trying. Thanks for the replies!

[imdakine1]

So if I want to connect the steam deck to a macbook you can do so with the sock that has HDMI and the usb c capture device that has an hdmi and the hdmi from the dock goes into the hdmi to the macbook and the steam deck will display on the macbook?

[windycity92]

hi! i too was hoping the shadowcast would be enough to just play using my mbp laptop but can't seem to find a fix so far.. anyone successful?

[Toytone]

I just started look into it, because it works i.e. with the teensy stuff to use it with a special program.. I was hoping that there's a solution like that for Steam Deck and Macbook too.. https://www.reddit.com/r/m8tracker/comments/11astji/connecting_to_an_external_display/ Would be soooo cool!!!