I know about the "good ones." I'm simply trying to add SD reader function and/or USB peripherals.

Well you dont really need TB speeds for either of the things you mentioned... so any dock would be fine.

bought this one last year for M1 MBA, works as expected

[www.amazon.com]

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Edited 999 time(s). Last edit at 12:08PM by jdc.

True, I guess I'd rather future proof if I can find a good ome for less than $50 or so.

Quote
mrbigstuff
True, I guess I'd rather future proof if I can find a good ome for less than $50 or so.

Yeah... not gonna happen. Even a good normal hub can go $80 easy. Mine just happened to be super cheap.

Honestly, not sure what "future proofing" gets you in this case. Unless you are a power user with plans to get NVMe RAID 0 setup for fast video storage, or something along those lines, saturating the bus will never happen.

SD cards are sloooooow. Any nice drive, like the sandsisc below -- can easily run near full speed with any basic hub.

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Edited 999 time(s). Last edit at 12:08PM by jdc.

I got this one last year .amazon

Like jdc, I went with a cheap USB-C w/ HDMI out. Not using with a MB,
and I already have a USB 10GB hub; just needed the HDMI.

Benfei aluminum was $14 @ bezosville.

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With SD card and HDMI slots

and this is the lessor and slower version just asst USB slots.

Designed for the colorful flat iMac. I bought it at the hyper site and got 10% off and free shipping. The daughter's Green M1 iMac should arrive Monday.

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---

Staunton, Virginia

Had previously been tempted by something like this - $65 w free ship, obo - but not very future-proofed. For that,
I’d check out our esteemed forum sponsor’s recent offering. More $, but you get what you pay for.

Hi everyone,

I'm looking for a USB-C dock that is compatible with the 2019 iMac. But, it needs to have a separate power supply. So many of them are out there except they don't have their own power supplies. They rely on juice from the computer itself or the computer's power supply. I want one that has its own dedicated power supply. Or, if not its own, a recommendation for a power supply to use with it.

I may end up just splurging for the CalDigit TS3+ Thunderbolt 3 dock. Seems to offer exactly what I want. It's just very pricey. It was pricey before Thunderbolt 4 and USB 4. I'm hoping a newer version appears and the price for the current model drops a bit.

[www.amazon.com]

Robert

Robert,

The new OWC Thunderbolt dock is less than the Caldigit, and also uses an external power supply, as far as I can see.

I have several of these, home and work.

They are USB-C, have a great port selection, separate power supply and also include DisplayLink tech (and so I also use to add a second external monitor to this MBA).

[smile.amazon.com]

EDIT: Wow, other people seem to like them, too. The price is up $75 over my purchase in Mar. But I have no complaints, been simply use-and-forget.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/21/2021 10:23AM by sekker.

Quote
sekker
I have several of these, home and work.

They are USB-C, have a great port selection, separate power supply and also include DisplayLink tech (and so I also use to add a second external monitor to this MBA).

Nice. but FWIW, not Tbolt, and looks like the fastest port is only 500 MB/s? No 1000 MB/s?

Id guess The cost is mostly for the display link tech to run multiple montiros on a M1. If that were my goal I might do more shopping, perhaps looking at a pluggable device, which I think do have Tbolt. But same $200+ cost.

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Edited 999 time(s). Last edit at 12:08PM by jdc.

Quote
jdc

Quote
sekker
I have several of these, home and work.

They are USB-C, have a great port selection, separate power supply and also include DisplayLink tech (and so I also use to add a second external monitor to this MBA).

Nice. but FWIW, not Tbolt, and looks like the fastest port is only 500 MB/s? No 1000 MB/s?

Id guess The cost is mostly for the display link tech to run multiple montiros on a M1. If that were my goal I might do more shopping, perhaps looking at a pluggable device, which I think do have Tbolt. But same $200+ cost.

I agree that the DisplayLink tech adds a premium to this product class.

I am not sure what a 'pluggable' device is. But finding one that's thunderbolt and DisplayLink was hard to find for me. If you have an example, please post.

On this MBA - I use this dock for ethernet in, video and audio out, and to connect printer/scanner, keyboard and mouse. I do not connect a lot of external hard drives etc. But there IS a second TB port on these M1 Macs if you need such I/O. I use the second to drive a 5k monitor personally.

Plugable — one g — is a brand.

This is the one I was thinking about to get 3 screens on a M1 mini. think they have more options. It says thunderbolt— but don’t think it is? If u really interested maybe more poking around on their site.

[plugable.com]

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Edited 999 time(s). Last edit at 12:08PM by jdc.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/21/2021 02:48PM by jdc.

Quote
jdc
Plugable — one g — is a brand.

This is the one I was thinking about to get 3 screens on a M1 mini. think they have more options. It says thunderbolt— but don’t think it is? If u really interested maybe more poking around on their site.

[plugable.com]

That looks like a great thunderbolt dock (supporting downstream 10gbps USB-C), but it doesn't have displaylink and won't drive 3 screens with an M1 mini.

[plugable.com] - This one has displaylink, but isn't thunderbolt.

With the mini, you can use the above dock for 3 displays and still have 1 thunderbolt port open on the mini for a fast SSD etc. A bit more options than the M1 Air in terms of on board ports.

Thanks. I was on my phone. Maybe got the wrong link. They have several options.

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Edited 999 time(s). Last edit at 12:08PM by jdc.

The comment on HDCP is interesting. I guess I just don’t watch a lot of streaming videos on my work Mac!

Huh.

From [plugable.com] :

APPLE M1 USERS MAY ENCOUNTER DOCK DETECTION ISSUES UPON REBOOT: [kb.plugable.com]

I'd really like a 40Gbps enclosure for my 8200 NVMe, but it that it might still run 25-30% slower on my M1 isn't very heartening.

Still, even the slowest SSD speed should be faster than the ~150Mbps that I get with my various 2T portable spinners, even with the M1.

(I'll have to check that to be sure.)

---

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I *love* SIGs. It's Glocks I hate.

Since M1 Minis were brought up, anyone tried the Qwiizlab USB-C (3.1) Hub
w/ NVMe and SSD connections plus a 10Gbps USB-C port but no video?
$85a/c @ bezosville
4.1 out of 5 Stars (44 reviews)

---

39°36'17"N 75°44'43"W

DuckDuckGo
The search engine that doesn't track you.

DemComm Records 2021 Greatest Hits
includes:
Taxman by Joe & Nancy's Rich Ice Cream Band
The Humpty Dance by The Harris-Brown Hookup
Lets Spend The Night Together by The Fang-Swalwell Gang
Díaz-Canel Is A Friend of Ours by The AOC Squad
My Old Kentucky Retirement Home by MitchMcC & The Soggy Boxer Boys
Burning Down The House by Merrick & The Goons
Back In the USSR by Bernie's Red Square Trio

pdq,

That one requires Big Sur or later. Still running Mojave on my machines. I plan to upgrade to a newer flavor of the OS once I have Mojave running in a virtual machine but, until then, Mojave is the OS of choice. That's why I'm looking at the CalDigit. May end up just getting a cheap powered USB 3 hub to do the job since that's all I really need right now.

Robert