Sold now but I’d rather spend another £50 and have a new one personally.
CalDigit Thunderbolt 4 Pro Dock
- Thread starter ChrisD.
- Start date
Associate
Blackmagic Disk Speed test, default:
Orico TB3 enclosure
TS4 direct: 2172.5 write, 2542.9 read
Element hub (via TS4): 1958.2 write, 2541.1 read
MBP M3 Pro direct: 2256.1 write, 2532.9 write
UGreen USB4 enclosure
TS4 direct: 1653.4 write, 1674.6 read
Element hub (via TS4): 1138.3 write, 1034.6 read
MBP M3 Pro direct: 2237.9 write, 1811.2 read
I guess that shows a decent Thunderbolt 3 enclosure beats out a USB4 enclosure!
Disk is NVMe WD Black SN750 1TB, same disk in each enclosure.
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I already bought one, brand new for £299 from Apple.
Commissario
@ChrisD.
This says three TB4 ports but one is the uplink to the computer, isn't it? So only two usable TB4 ports on the back? The other USB-C ports are just that, standard USB-C?
This says three TB4 ports but one is the uplink to the computer, isn't it? So only two usable TB4 ports on the back? The other USB-C ports are just that, standard USB-C?
Did you forget to put a link? I’m not sure. I only need one extra.
Associate
That’s correct. Three rear, one of which for host. Fourth is USB-C 10G
Caporegime
I've got one of these hooked up to my M4 mac mini and it makes for a super clean setup. I have it under the desk and both my monitors go into it, the keyboard and my speakers then I have my hardware 2FA key attached at the back of the mac mini along with the cable from the TS4. Works really well.
Caporegime
Okay, it looks like I will need one of these...not cheap but will solve all my problems.
Commissario
You do. It’ll probably be cheaper through the education store as well - it’s £270 with my wife’s blue light discount.
Caporegime
I checked, no discount on the edu store for this.
I personally hate my caldigit hub. It doesn't make me coffee when I require it, nor does it allow me to hassle feek about his desktop decoration habits. That's all manual raymondo, and i'm not about that life. it does a bunch of other stuff including let me run a display at 144hz, so I suppose it can stay.
WAIT. Does that mean if i have two of those hubs, I can run two displays at 144hz? Or am I just being extraordinarily thick about the way thunderbolt works.
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Caporegime
So, just scrolling online I notice the green Revodok Max 213 for £215 (Thereabouts).
It looks like it has 2 fewer USB-A at the back (but 1 more on the front) and 1 fewer thunderbolt at the back. No Audio or Line out at the back (not a problem, the Mac has it).
£85 difference.....Hmmmmm. Leaning towards the UGREEN at the moment, as the peripherals for USB-A are keyboard, microphone, webcam, low bandwidth stuff which I can solve by putting in a £10 USB-A hub
It looks like it has 2 fewer USB-A at the back (but 1 more on the front) and 1 fewer thunderbolt at the back. No Audio or Line out at the back (not a problem, the Mac has it).
£85 difference.....Hmmmmm. Leaning towards the UGREEN at the moment, as the peripherals for USB-A are keyboard, microphone, webcam, low bandwidth stuff which I can solve by putting in a £10 USB-A hub
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I am wary of any docks that are not Caldigit. I tried a bunch and all had various issues, and then the CD TS3 just worked, and the TS3+ and TS4 have been equally as reliable. Ugreen maybe awesome, I'd defo test it for the whole of the return month, just to be sure.
Caporegime
I asked the same question on another forum and someone at work has 3 Caldigit TS3 at work in his team and 2 broke.
Small sample size I know but it seems Caldigit aren’t bulletproof either.
I've never had any dock stop working/breaking, I was talking more about driver issues, disconnects and other similar problems. 2 docks dying does seem high.
Caporegime
He also commented that the SD card in the Caldigit is slower than the built in one in the MacBook. That’s not a dealbreaker though.
I will sleep on it and decide. The UGREEN will work but I’ve found a comment from an user that if the DP port is connected to a 4k monitor, the write speed in the thunderbolt 4 port on the SSD drop from 2800mbps to 2000mbps. So there is a bandwidth bottleneck.
although I’m not sure if it’s a UGREEN specific issue but a TB4 issue.