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leeuk321

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jul 21, 2018
170
143
I was just wondering if anyone has used a USB-C docking station with DisplayLink on their 12" Macbook, connected to a 4K monitor @ 60Hz? It seems that there was a problem last year with Mac's new drivers not getting along well with DisplayLink drivers, but that's been sorted out now with Mojave. Or something like that. Because of that, it's hard to actually see how good these devices are, because bad reviews could be from people who didn't have Mojave or the latest drivers.

I can't quite get my head around it, because a lot of these USB-C docking stations boast that they output 4K or 5K at 60Hz (and sometimes dual or triple display), plus they have several USB 3.0 ports. So, with it being a USB-C device, something's gotta give, right? I'm not expecting miracles, I'm just trying to figure out what exactly gives if you connect to a 4K monitor @ 60Hz and also connect a USB 3.0 drive. Or maybe two USB 3.0 drives. Does the display elegantly reduce the refresh rate to 30Hz? Does the hard drive speed elegantly drop to USB 2.0 speed? Or does the whole system just freak out, with your monitor flickering and hard drives clucking. And these are USB-C docks that I'm referring to, not Thunderbolt docks. They even state in their specs that although you can use the docks with a Thunderbolt port, it will only go at 5gbps USB-C speed.

I've tried to call a couple of manufacturers to ascertain how they behave in certain situations, but not a single one has managed to shed any light on it beyond "I think it'll be fine." The main manufacturers of these USB-C docking stations with DisplayLink seem to be Kensington, Targus, Plugable, Waylink, StarTech, HP and Dell.

If anyone could shed some light on these docking stations or share their recent experience it'd be much appreciated!
 
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