Third, it should have a lot of ports, at least if you’re not looking for a solution to take with you on vacation or a business trip, as more ports equal larger size.įinally, it’s important to have high transmission speeds to facilitate easy operations. Most of our recommendations house 85W of charging power, while those weaker have other advantages to make up for it.

Second, it has to provide a lot of power. There are a few characteristics you should pay attention to when choosing your ideal Thunderbolt 3 docking station.įirst of all, there need to be at least two Thunderbolt 3 ports to support relevant devices. Therefore, if your host device doesn’t have Thunderbolt 3, you might want to skip this guide and look for a USB-C Dock only. In other words, only more recent devices, like newer Macs or higher-end Windows computers, have included the support for Thunderbolt 3.

However, this also means that one connector does several different things, so it’s best to consult the device’s manual before connecting anything to avoid poor performance because you plugged the wrong connector into the wrong port. Having one cable has its advantages, such as removing the clutter associated with several different cables taking up space on your desk. Such docks also enable simultaneous transfer of data, output video, charging, and daisy-chaining of other TB gadgets, all via only one cable. The main difference being that Thunderbolt 3 can supports higher data-transfer speeds (up to 40GBps) in comparison to USB-C (Up to 10GBps), facilitating it in both directions simultaneously through a single cable.

These useful connectors also provide the necessary bandwidth and speed for all connected devices.īoth USB-C and TB3-based docks feature a USB-C connector, although they differ in other important areas. So, if you are someone who owns any of the latest Macbooks or Windows-based Ultrabooks that is equipped with the Thunderbolt 3 port, a Thunderbolt dock can help you connect several peripherals.įrom dual 4K Display monitors to NAS Storage to printers and audio interface all from a single cable. Manufacturers are looking to produce sleek and stylish looking laptops to attract new buyers, and the only way to do is by removing ports that take up a lot of space.Īlso, one of the reasons why these ports are being removed is because they don’t handle data transfer as efficiently as new ports, and they’re limited when it comes to multiple connections and charging. USB-A, VGA, HDMI, and in some cases even SD Card slots are being removed from professional-grade laptops and replaced by USB-C and Thunderbolt 3 ports. thin and light laptops meant only one thing.

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