Sonnet Announces Availability of Long-Delayed Echo 15+ Thunderbolt 2 Dock

[MacRumors]

Sonnet this week announced the launch of its long-awaited Echo 15+ Thunderbolt 2 Dock, which is a 16-port docking station compatible with all Mac and Windows computers that feature Thunderbolt ports. It offers four USB 3.0 Ports, two 6Gb/s eSata ports, a FireWire 800 port, a Gigabit Ethernet port, two 3.5mm audio inputs, two 3.5mm audio outputs, and two Thunderbolt 2 ports.

A drive bay with 6Gb/s interfaces for one 3.5 inch or two 2.5-inch internal SATA drives is included, with support for SSD speeds of up to 750 MB/s. The USB 3.0 ports included in the dock provide 7.5 watts of power each for charging iPads, iPhones, and other electronic devices even when a computer is turned off.

The Echo 15+ also includes a built-in optical drive, and users are able to choose from an 8x DVD+/-RW drive, a Blu-ray BD-ROM/8x DVD+/-RW drive with Blu-ray player software for OS X, or a Blu-ray burner 4x BD-R/8x DVD+/-RW drive. Using an optical Thunderbolt cable and Sonnet's Thunderbolt 2 expansion systems, the Echo 15+ can be connected to computer equipment located up to 60 meters away.

According to Sonnet, the Echo 15+'s aluminum case is sturdy enough to support the latest 27-inch iMac or a comparable display up to 34 inches.

"The Echo 15+ is the ultimate docking station for users to connect every device they need, including current and legacy devices -- even the latest Ultra HD 4K displays -- and expand their storage for backup or increased capacity in a single desktop device that connects to their computer with a Thunderbolt cable," said Greg LaPorte, vice president of sales and marketing, Sonnet Technologies. "With the option to add internal storage supporting data transfer rates of up to 750 MB/s, as well as the ability to read from and write to optical media including Blu-rayTM Disc, Sonnet's Echo 15+ Thunderbolt 2 Dock is the go-to station for flexible connectivity."

Sonnet first announced the Echo 15 Thunderbolt docking station in April of 2013 and began accepting pre-orders at that time. Following the launch of Thunderbolt 2, the dock was delayed in early 2014 as Sonnet decided to upgrade the device to support it, and nearly two years after that, the dock is finally ready.

Pricing on the Echo 15+ Thunderbolt 2 Dock starts at $469 for the version with a DVD+/-RW Drive and goes up to $999 for the version with a Blu-ray Burner and two included 500GB SSDs. The dock can be purchased from the Sonnet website.

Article Link: Sonnet Announces Availability of Long-Delayed Echo 15+ Thunderbolt 2 Dock

 

[avanpelt]

Looks nice. Strange that they didn't include an HDMI port.

 

[fenderbass146]

Looks nice and I completely understand and think it's a fair price for this particular model...I understand Thunderbolt is for professionally but when are they going to release a reasonably priced thunderbolt dock for the consumer under $120. Thunderbolt has no chance of taking off if prices stay this high.

 

[mattwolfmatt]

Looks nice and I completely understand and think it's a fair price for this particular model...I understand Thunderbolt is for professionally but when are they going to release a reasonably priced thunderbolt dock for the consumer under $120. Thunderbolt has no chance of taking off if prices stay this high.

The Belkin Thunderbolt 2 dock is $300, and includes a cable (aren't those like a $50 cable?) http://www.belkin.com/us/p/P-F4U085/ I have the Belkin Thunderbolt 1 dock and love it. Speeds are certainly fine for me.

To say there are no reasonably priced docks is simply not a true statement. Don't judge all docks by this $1000 one.

 

[fenderbass146]

The Belkin Thunderbolt 2 dock is $300, and includes a cable (aren't those like a $50 cable?) http://www.belkin.com/us/p/P-F4U085/ I have the Belkin Thunderbolt 1 dock and love it. Speeds are certainly fine for me.

To say there are no reasonably priced docks is simply not a true statement. Don't judge all docks by this $1000 one.

I'm not judging it. I think price is fair compared to the competition, however as a consumer that would just like a easy way to dock my computer when I get home I would be all over a $150 dock that has two monitors outputs a few usb 3.0 ports and an ethernet port. However three years into thunderbolt I don't see any chance of that happening.

 

[macduke]

The lower end model is priced a bit steep. Thought the higher-end model was reasonable given the two SSDs but then I looked up 512GB SSD prices and holy crap have they fallen since I last checked. Most are in the $150-200 range.

For the longest time I wanted a good Thunderbolt dock. The early units kept being delayed and then had crappy reviews. They also usually left out a random key feature. Then Thunderbolt 2 came along and I can't use any of these newer docks until I upgrade my 2012 rMBP. However, what I found years ago is that a USB 3.0 7 port hub and a few USB 3.0 adapters goes quite a long way. It doesn't handle the display problem but it handles everything else (eSATA adapter, several hard drives, audio inputs/outputs, ethernet, CF card readers, Wacom tablet, etc) so I only need to plug a couple things into my Mac. At first it was glitchy but the early USB 3.0 chipsets were pretty buggy in my experience. The second one I tried was fairly reliable if it didn't pull too much power and the third one, the 7-port monster that has a couple extra charging ports at the bottom is capable of powering everything I have.

 

[afd]

I'm ok for storage, I have a Synology DS attached to my router, but like the idea of one of these. I currently have a 2011 iMac, which is all going well but might replace with a MacBook Pro or Air so might feel the need of one of these, even if I replace with a new iMac.
How fast would an SSD be if is I stuck one in a Sonnet dock and moved my OS to it? I thought I might have to open up my iMac at some point and stick in a SSD, this would be easier.

 

[maflynn]

What am I am I missing with the price set for 650. Seems extraordinarily expensive

 

[ignatius345]

[edit: nevermind, I see that Blu-Ray is indeed an option]

I could see this fitting into a professional setup -- but at this price it should seriously have a Blu-Ray drive in it.

 

[btrach144]

TB2 and only 3.0? Thunderbolt 3 and USB 3.1 are already out. This thing is already outdated. At 650, its an expensive outdated product!

 

[tillsbury]

TB2 and only 3.0? Thunderbolt 3 and USB 3.1 are already out. This thing is already outdated. At 650, its an expensive outdated product!

How exactly is a dock supposed to provide TB3 when it's connected to a computer with only TB2?

 

[jayducharme]

I spent over a year waiting for this product and finally gave up. I'm very happy with my OWC Thunderbolt dock. Sonnet was too late to the gate with this. And with only 4 USB ports, it's not much more versatile than a stand-alone Mac. I'm surprised about the inclusion of two e-SATA ports. HDMI or more hi-power USB or even a card reader might have been more useful to more people.

 

[JustThinkin']

The lower end model is priced a bit steep. Thought the higher-end model was reasonable given the two SSDs but then I looked up 512GB SSD prices and holy crap have they fallen since I last checked. Most are in the $150-200 range.

For the longest time I wanted a good Thunderbolt dock. The early units kept being delayed and then had crappy reviews. They also usually left out a random key feature. Then Thunderbolt 2 came along and I can't use any of these newer docks until I upgrade my 2012 rMBP. However, what I found years ago is that a USB 3.0 7 port hub and a few USB 3.0 adapters goes quite a long way. It doesn't handle the display problem but it handles everything else (eSATA adapter, several hard drives, audio inputs/outputs, ethernet, CF card readers, Wacom tablet, etc) so I only need to plug a couple things into my Mac. At first it was glitchy but the early USB 3.0 chipsets were pretty buggy in my experience. The second one I tried was fairly reliable if it didn't pull too much power and the third one, the 7-port monster that has a couple extra charging ports at the bottom is capable of powering everything I have.

My CalDigit TB2 dock is backward compatible with TB on my 15" 2012 (non-r)MBP. It even has an HDMI out. It runs dual-monitors (1600x1200) plus the internal display on the 512MB nVidia GPU (although I don't think Apple ever advertised it as capable of this). I have about 7 peripherals running across that one TB link (some TB, some USB, some HDMI).

The CalDigit is well worth the ~$200 it cost (especially for the dual monitors).

 

[btrach144]

How exactly is a dock supposed to provide TB3 when it's connected to a computer with only TB2?

Correct, TB3 uses USB-C so someone with TB2 using the MDP connection won't be able to use TB3.

 

[Glassed Silver]

How exactly is a dock supposed to provide TB3 when it's connected to a computer with only TB2?

Question: when you buy a new Mac, do you buy EVERYTHING NEW you attach to it or do you carry over external drives and other devices?

I personally don't throw everything out, because... Why?
Why make these devices not future-proof?

Glassed Silver:mac

 

[WilliamG]

The lower end model is priced a bit steep. Thought the higher-end model was reasonable given the two SSDs but then I looked up 512GB SSD prices and holy crap have they fallen since I last checked. Most are in the $150-200 range.

For the longest time I wanted a good Thunderbolt dock. The early units kept being delayed and then had crappy reviews. They also usually left out a random key feature. Then Thunderbolt 2 came along and I can't use any of these newer docks until I upgrade my 2012 rMBP. However, what I found years ago is that a USB 3.0 7 port hub and a few USB 3.0 adapters goes quite a long way. It doesn't handle the display problem but it handles everything else (eSATA adapter, several hard drives, audio inputs/outputs, ethernet, CF card readers, Wacom tablet, etc) so I only need to plug a couple things into my Mac. At first it was glitchy but the early USB 3.0 chipsets were pretty buggy in my experience. The second one I tried was fairly reliable if it didn't pull too much power and the third one, the 7-port monster that has a couple extra charging ports at the bottom is capable of powering everything I have.

Thunderbolt 2 is backward compatible, so it will work just fine at TB1 speed on your 2012 rMBP.

 

[theluggage]

Then Thunderbolt 2 came along and I can't use any of these newer docks until I upgrade my 2012 rMBP.

From the specs: "Mac® with a Thunderbolt or Thunderbolt 2 port" - pretty sure that applies to all the TB2 docks around. PCs require TB2 because of a driver limitation in Windows so there might be an issue if you're using Bootcamp.

What am I am I missing with the price set for 650. Seems extraordinarily expensive

Well, compared with Caldigit's $200 dock:

- its got a built-in optical drive. When this was announced sometime back in the 14th century, that might have been useful.

- its got space for 1x 3.5" or 2x2.5" internal hard drives or SSDs. That's a bit more like it, and if you look at the cost of getting a Caldigit dock plus a dual bay TB drive enclosure like this then the Sonnet price sounds more reasonable... except, the Caldigit dock has eSATA and you can get eSATA drive enclosures for a fraction of the cost of Thunderbolt solutions. So you're paying a big premium for a neat (but, IMHO, hideously ugly) all-in-one solution.

How exactly is a dock supposed to provide TB3 when it's connected to a computer with only TB2?

True, you can't really criticise a dock available today for not having TB3 (or USB 3.1 since I don't know if OS X supports that yet). However, while I'd have bought this in a flash when it was announced 2 years ago, now... I'll probably replace my MBP in the next year and it seems likely that the replacement will have TB3/USB-C.

It runs dual-monitors (1600x1200) plus the internal display on the 512MB nVidia GPU

...presumably one of those is a Thunderbolt display, though... or have you found some magic way of driving two non-TB displays from a Caldigit hub?

 

[afd]

Also, why is it black? Why not aluminium?

 

[powerless]

Review: http://www.macworld.com/article/300...-2-dock-review-a-big-box-of-connectivity.html

 

[satcomer]

Why would someone need to use this because it uses a plugin that they probably won't update during the next OS X update?

 

[JustThinkin']

...presumably one of those is a Thunderbolt display, though... or have you found some magic way of driving two non-TB displays from a Caldigit hub?

No, the MBP TB port goes to the CalDigit dock; the TB "out" port from the dock chains to two LaCie TB (TB2?) desktop drives, then the 2nd TB drive has a generic DP to HDMI adapter attached to the TB "out" port. One monitor connects to the CalDigit HDMI, and one to the adapter.

 

[tillsbury]

Question: when you buy a new Mac, do you buy EVERYTHING NEW you attach to it or do you carry over external drives and other devices?

I personally don't throw everything out, because... Why?
Why make these devices not future-proof?

Glassed Silver:mac

The original poster said that the product was already obsolete, because it doesn't support a technology that isn't even available in Macs yet. Would you say the iPhone 6S is obsolete because it doesn't support 5G?

 

[talkybear]

A dock with a fan. No thanks.

 

[Mr. Retrofire]

How exactly is a dock supposed to provide TB3 when it's connected to a computer with only TB2?

Future compatibility is important for professionals. TB3 is also backward compatible, AFAIK.

Thunderbolt™ 3 Controllers Launch with the 6th Gen Intel® Core™ Processors at IFA Show
and
Chip Shot: Intel® Thunderbolt™ 3 Controller Achieves USB 3.1 Certification

...Thunderbolt 3 controllers can provide two separate ports with USB 3.1 support and dedicated bandwidth of 10 Gbps each, providing more bandwidth than other USB controllers...

 

[Mr. Retrofire]

The original poster said that the product was already obsolete, because it doesn't support a technology that isn't even available in Macs yet.

The MacBook uses already USB 3.1 and the Skylake processors in the newest iMacs support TB3.

The truth is that the majority of customers needs 4x10 GBit/s ports instead of a single 40 GBit/s port.