Plugable 13-in-1 USB C Docking Station 4K Triple Monitor with 100W Power Delivery | USB C Dock for Windows, Mac, ChromeOS, Thunderbolt | Driver Required | 3X HDMI and 3X DisplayPort (UD-ULTC4K)

As a guy who works in IT I never would have believed that any laptop in 2023 would ever go back to only working with one monitor after almost any laptop made in the past 5 years would easily work with 2-3 monitors. As I started to support people using M1 and M2 Apple laptops I was baffled to find that they only work with one monitor. My first assumption was that my co-workers didn't know jack diddly squat since obviously I'm the expert here. Imagine my humiliation when I found out they were right. This has kept me up at night, so here I am venting about it to my fellow Amazon explorers.Apple just keeps making my life harder by convincing people that their bantha poodoo computers with 8GB RAM in 2023 are better than my professional recommendations.What is DisplayLink? - All you need to know is that it enables laptops that only support one monitor to work with two monitors. It basically works by compressing display data so that there is enough bandwidth to send data to a second monitor on a poopy data pipeline. Magically, it makes a useless Apple laptop a little more tolerable.There is one downside I've noticed while using this. A lot of my co-workers use this with the laptop display on as well as 2 external 4K monitors. The first external monitor works fine, but the second extra monitor has a noticeably lower frame/refresh rate. It's fine if you aren't watching videos or doing anything graphical. (Not like their laptop could handle that stuff in the first place) Most people just make that their email or spreadsheet monitor. I would assume that this probably only happens with 2 4K displays. I don't have other displays to test unfortunately. People obviously still prefer to have a slower second monitor than no second monitor at all. However, regardless of how annoying that downside might be, I don't blame Plugable. I blame Apple. Plugable is performing miracles by creating something out of nothing. Apple is just creating a demand for miracles.The last helpful thing you should know is the difference between Plugable's DisplayLink docks vs their Thunderbolt 3 Docks... If your laptop has a Thunderbolt port AND (the important word is 'AND') has a CPU/GPU/APU that supports 2+ external monitors then you definitely want the Thunderbolt dock. You will have plenty of bandwidth to use multiple 4K monitors at the same time at full speed. If you are moneybanks enough to have a high-end Apple laptop with a slightly less poopy CPU that supports 2+ monitors you will also want the Thunderbolt 3 dock instead. It works fine.DisplayLink Dock - Makes a poopy computer better than it was. If your DisplayLink dock could talk they would tell your lappy, "It's okay little guy, I'll try to translate your sign language so the other monitor can understand what you're trying to say."Thunderbolt 3 Dock - Makes your monitors treat your laptop like the champ it is. If your Thunderbolt docky could talk this is what it would look like:Docky: It's okay little gu...Lappy: LITTLE GUY!?? DO YOU KNOW WHO I AM??!??!Docky: Uhhh, where did the other guy go?Lappy: OTHER GUY? I KILLED THE OTHER GUY! I'M THE NEW GUY AND THINGS ARE GOING TO WORK A LITTLE DIFFERENTLY AROUND HERE!Docky: My apologies, I just haven't talked to a coherent computer in years. What are your orders sir?Lappy: INTERPRET MY INCREDIBLE DANCE MOVES AND DISPLAY THE INFORMATION ON ALL FOUR 4K MONITORS!Docky: AYE AYE CAP'N!!!!Narrator: And they lived happily ever after until the bearings on Lappy's cooling fans gave out 6 years later.

I was hesitant to purchase this dock because of the price - but after searching for quite a while this seemed to be one of the few docks that would allow a M2/M1 MacBook to use 3 external monitors with DisplayLink.I finally bit the bullet and bought it - and installed the DisplayLink Manager program before it even arrived.I thought there would be some issues getting started - but I was surprised to find that it worked right out of the box. The hardest part was plugging in all the HDMI cables!I saw some reviews complaining about how hot the dock gets. I tested by streaming two 2k HD movies at the same time for 30 minutes and neither the dock or the MacBook Air has gotten very hot at all.I also used the dock with HDMI & USB switches, USB hubs, ethernet (it pulled 1gig while running all 3 monitors, btw), mouse, keyboard and webcam. Everything just worked - except a 5v power-only laptop cooler.The laptop cooler didn't want to turn on after plugging it into the dock's USB ports... but it turns out the dock just needs to be plugged into the laptop to activate the power to it's USB ports.Honestly, that's pretty smart since it conserves energy and heat. It also means I don't have to fiddle with the cooler's switch every time I need to turn it on too.Overall - I was expecting a struggle to get it all working, and there was none. It's worked with every single thing I've thrown at it right away - I highly recommend this dock!If you're reading this in the future - please note I *will* make an update if the Dock ever dies on me. If there's no update - it lives!Thank you Plugable - 10/10!

Plugable 4K Docking Station Triple Monitor with 100W Power Delivery, USB-C Dock is a great product. Easy to use and set up. I had an older monitor that Customer Service helped me connect correctly (HDMI to DCM? cord). Year later, Windows update caused issue with it not showing 3 monitors, support helped me track down the changes in windows to correct the issue.Fantastic Product. Great Customer Service, Easy to use.