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TB1 to TB3 dock with apple cable and TB3->TB2 adapter

mjohnston39

mjohnston39

macrumors newbie
Original poster
May 25, 2010
16
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I've got a late 2012 iMac (TB1) and want to add a dock and it looks like iMac-> Apple TB2 cable-> Apple TB2/TB3 adapter-> TB3 Dock (CalDigit) should work. Anyone have experience with this and will the display port on the dock be functional?

Thanks
 
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I have a mid-2011 Mac Mini and a mid-2011 iMac each connected to a TB3 dock (not the Caldigit) this way and it works.

The 2011 Macs don’t have USB3 ports so using the TB1 port is much better than FW800 and USB2.

The 2012 has USB3 so the advantages of using a TB dock aren’t as significant.

The display port works fine for me in Mac OS X but I haven’t got it working in Windows. I wonder if I’m missing a driver or need to use an active adapter.

I’ve even booted off a bus powered TB3 NVMe disk (it gets power from the TB3 dock) into OS X. The speeds are faster than what you’d get with a single internal SATA III SSD.

On the iMac I’ve booted into Windows as well with similarly impressive performance. For booting reliably into Windows from an external drive it’s important that it’s setup such that the external Windows partition appears to be an internal partition.
 
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mjohnston39 said:
Anyone have experience with this and will the display port on the dock be functional?
Click to expand...
I have on my Late 2012 iMac, and 17" Late 2011 MBP.

Mac TB1 port >TB2 cable > TB3/TB2 Bidirectional adapter > CalDigit Thunderbolt Station 3 Lite dock.

Everything works fine.

The only issue I had was with the MBP and the DP port on the dock, and my monitor wouldn't always wake up from a sleep.

I suspect this had more to do with my monitor, and less to do with the dock, but I didn't have issues when the MBP was connected directly to the monitor.

Unplugging the monitor's power and plugging it back it got it to work.

As I have had other issues with the monitor not always turning on after waking up my PC laptop that was connected to a different dock, I suspect this was a monitor issue.

mdgm said:
I’ve even booted off a bus powered TB3 NVMe disk (it gets power from the TB3 dock) into OS X. The speeds are faster than what you’d get with a single internal SATA III SSD.
Click to expand...
I am currently booting my Late 2012 iMac from a TB3 NVMe SSD, and can confirm that it is fast with speeds almost 900MBps. I am pretty sure it is the fastest drive (without getting into striping RAIDs) possible for the Late 2012 iMac, internal or external.
 
mdgm said:
The 2012 has USB3 so the advantages of using a TB dock aren’t as significant.
Click to expand...
The TB 3 dock gives USB 3.1 gen 2 (980 MB/s or a little bit less if you are limited to Thunderbolt 1). True, going to USB 3.1 gen 2 from USB 3.0 is not as significant is going from USB 2.0.
 
I did exactly this two weeks ago, only with my mid-2012 13" MBP, which also has TB1 (and USB 3.0 ports). Monitor is a Dell U2717D plugged into the DisplayPort on the Caldigit TS3 Plus.

It works perfectly for me except for one small, laptop-specific issue; if I unplug and re-plug the TB1 cable multiple times (if I'm working from home and take the laptop away to sit on the couch, then come back and plug in at the desktop for a while, then an hour later back to the couch, then back to the desktop, etc etc), after somewhere between three and six unpluggings/repluggings my external monitor (Dell U2717D) doesn't come back on when I replug. I don't know if it's a monitor, hub or (elderly) laptop issue, but whatever it is, a quick reboot fixes the problem. It's not really causing me any serious issues - maybe once a week I have to do an extra reboot.

All that said, as you have an iMac I'm sure this wouldn't apply to your use case - I'm assuming you're not moving your iMac three times day while still booted!

Incidentally, I also have an OWC ThunderBay4 TB2 hard drive enclosure, which is daisy-chained from the dock's TB3 pass through port, using an Apple TB2/TB3 adaptor -> Apple TB2 cable. It work flawlessly, achieving max data throughput speeds from the 3.5" HDDs therein. I'm glad I paid for the Apple cables - it all just works.
 
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