Please find a business notebook with a full-fledged docking station here SCHENKER F516. All I/O-Ports are lead to the outside via PCI-Express. The docking station features its own PSU and is able to charge the battery of the notebook.
Next to the ordinary, proprietary docking stations there are also so-called port replicators. While their use was pretty restricted when there were mostly USB 2.0 ports, they become more and more valued by customers as USB 3.0 and further ports make more use of them.
Docking Station / Port Replicator with USB 3.0
Widely used are port replicators with USB 3.0. They offer sufficient bandwidth to provide the following ports:
- Gigabit-LAN
- USB 2.0 and USB 3.0
- Stereo-Sound (in and out)
- DVI-I (compatible with VGA) and HDMI
These docking station or port replicators offer all possibilities to connect all peripheral devices needed on your desk with Plug&Play. These docking stations feature dedicated controller for all ports. The display ports are controlled by a special DisplayLink-Controller and allow you to operate two external monitors with a resolution of up to 2048x1152, on top of the display of the notebook itself.
Important information:
- For easily operating the docking station, all manufacturer's drivers need to be up to date and installed correctly.
- There are many models on the market but not all of them are similarly reliable. Some models have stability problems under certain circumstances. We therefore recommend the following models at this time:
- j5 create USB 3.0 UltraStation JUD500
- i-tec Docking Station Advance
- i-tec Docking Station Advance Mini
- Toshiba Dynadock U3.0 Universal
- TARGUS USB 3.0 Dual Video (ACP70EUZ)
- DisplayLink-Controller (DL-3900) has some problems with displaying 3D applications in full screen mode. This means, we cannot recommend to play 3D games on monitors that are connected via docking station. This is hopefully going to change with new driver updates. To use full screen applications, please use the display of your notebook or a monitor directly plugged into your notebook.
Interesting test (in German) for universal docking stations with USB 3.0 can be found here:
Eins für alles - USB-Dockingstationen gegen den Kabelsalat in c't 12/2012
Toshiba Dynadock U3.0 Universal USB 3.0 Docking Station Review auf TweakTown.com
USB Docking Station im Test: Fujitsu USB 3.0 Port Replicator PR08 auf Notebookcheck.com
Docking-Station / Port-Replicator with USB 3.1 Gen2 Type-C
USB 3.1 Gen2 Type-C doubles USB bandwidth from 5 Gbit/s to 10 Gbit/s. Docking stations with this port generally do not differ from ones with USB 3.0 variants. Each port (LAN, sound, display etc.)is still managed by its own controller and is translated into an USB protocol. Double the bandwidth basically leads to the capacity of supporting higher display resolutions or the Gigabit-LAN-port can be better used while at the same time using the display.
At this time (February 2016) the range of products is unfortunately rather small, due to the fact that notebooks with USB 3.1 Gen2 Type-C are not widely offered yet.
Docking Station / Port-Replicator with Thunderbolt 3 Type-C
Thunderbolt 3 offers 40 Gbit/s via a native PCI-Express-ort, which means that the translation into USB protocol is not necessary. Also, Thunderbolt 3 can release a natives DisplayPort signal via Type-C. These port replicators will have an advantage when it comes to bandwidth and compatibility compared to their USB predecessors. But still a power supply is needed to support the notebook. Thunderbolt 3 is rather expensive due to time-consuming certification and to this date (February 2016) only available in high-end notebooks like the SCHENKER WORK-Series. A higher availability of Thunderbolt 3 via Type-C is expected with Intel Kaby Lake.