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Explaining 4K 60Hz Video Through USB-C Hub

253 points by tambourine_man 7y ago

dlevine 7y ago
Interesting! Was wondering about this recently when shopping for a USB-C hub, and couldn't find many that supported 4K@60hz. Ended up getting one that does 30hz because my Display at home is only 1440p. I have used Displaylink adapters before (have one floating around somewhere), and was not super impressed (my machine was a bit flaky when using it), although I did have 2 external displays going on my Macbook at one point (this was before the days of multiple Displayports on Macbooks), which was kind of fun.
- greggman2 7y ago
  I went through 3 of them before finding one that worked (the first was buying before I knew the issue existed. The second was being impatient). I'm using this one on a Macbook Air. (https://www.hypershop.com/products/hyperdrive-duo-hub-for-usb-c-macbook-pro-13-and-15-2016-2017-2018 https://www.hypershop.com/products/hyperdrive-duo-hub-for-us...). I'd prefer one that used a single USB-C connection (assuming that's possible) and that used a cable so it was useful for more than just the couple of devices that have 2 USB-C ports exactly that far apart but at the time, a year ago, that was one of the few choices. The good thing is it does work and I have it on 4k@60hz
adeeds 7y ago
I wish I had come across this article when I was looking for a dock for my MBP (connected to a pair of 4k monitors). It was a pain to try and figure out if I'd be able to get 60hz video from a particular docking station. I went with the Caldigit one and luckily it worked. It's nice to learn why.
craftinator 7y ago
I'm actually a bit confused by why it matters at this point. HDMI is ubiquitous, can handle a high enough resolution/ rate that most human eyes can't distinguish better, and is relatively cheap. It's an optimized, widely available format, and does a great job. USB is a downgrade for this particular task. Other than novelty, I don't see a reason to ever do this.
- SlowRobotAhead 7y ago
  If I were to guess, I would say it comes down to the U in USB, and power delivery.
- NullPrefix 7y ago
  >can handle a high enough resolution/ rate that most human eyes can't distinguish better Could you specify which resolution and refresh rate that is? Are we still talking about 1080p or this is higher?
- greggman2 7y ago
  What do you mean? Plenty of computers now ship with no other connectors than USB-C. In other words HDMI is not ubiquitous What I love about USB-C is I plug in a single cable to my laptop and I get keyboard, mouse, wifi, and monitor (4k 60hz) At work I have a USB-C hub for my one cable to my computer. The hub has Displayport so I can use HDMI on a different device. At home my monitor does USB-C natively so my keyboard and mouse are plugged into that.
  - Shorel 7y ago
    > Plenty of computers now ship with no other connectors than USB-C. In other words HDMI is not ubiquitous Sadly. Mine has USB-C and HDMI. I don't think I will buy a device without HDMI in the next 15 years.
- hobofromabroad 7y ago
  For instance: a lot of us want one cable to connect display, keyboard, mouse, power to the laptop (aka some device)?
- garmaine 7y ago
  You are getting down-voted because you didn't read the article.
- sannee 7y ago
  Oh you sweet summer child. If you want to buy a laptop these days, you have to shell out 300$ for what is basically half of the motherboard and connect it externally over USB-C.
SlowRobotAhead 7y ago
Entertaining read. What a blunder the USB group has made with v3.x, it’ll all work out and eventually be awesome when every port and every cable just works and things charge fast but, almost every major feature of USB has had issues going back to first release. More reviews and articles should have a liars section.
wavesquid 7y ago
The HP ZBook Dock with Thunderbolt 3 tends to be on ebay for around US$50 and should do 4K 60Hz.
- donatj 7y ago
  What are the odds one will work with a MacBook Pro?
- phire 7y ago
  Avoid that one. There is a reason why it's so cheap on ebay. Sure, it's a Thunderbolt 3 dock, but the two displayport ports aren't using thuderbolt 3. The are actually connected via USB displaylink.
  - _trampeltier 7y ago
    Uh, yes. Avoid that one. We have ZBooks and these Docks at work and we all have all kind of troubles. But the funny thing is, we all have different troubles. Mostly the keyboard or one or two monitors does not work ..
fulafel 7y ago
re "Driver availability and compatibility for Mac/Linux is spotty to non-existent": Is it true that DisplayLink doesn't work well with Linux? Some years ago people were saying that the usb-to-monitor dongles worked well. A casual web search also gives this impression, with good support provided by the DisplayLink company.
- jankotek 7y ago
  I use display-link dongle as port of USB-C docking station. It plugs and unplugs well, but driver uses a lot of cpu and there is no graphic acceleration. Not sure if would handl 4k video. Great for IDE.
- yaantc 7y ago
  You can make Display Link (DL) work with Linux, there are drivers from the vendor and an adaptation script for Debian based distros [1] (and variants for others IIRC). You may have to fiddle with the configuration to avoid issues like minor display corruptions or cursor glitches. I made it work clean once, but in the end I returned the dock. DL is to me a bad idea, except is some specific cases. The way DL works is that a driver on your PC creates a virtual frame per screen, composed on your PC. Then this screen(s) content is compressed and send to the dock DL chip using a proprietary driver. The chip on the dock reconstructs full images and send that to locally attached screen(s) using local HDMI or DisplayPort interfaces. Now yes, those local interface(s) may run at 60 Hz and be 4k. But the bottleneck is not there, it is in the compression and transmission over the USB link. In my experience, any use-cases with large changing content (e.g.: full screen video) will give a bad experience on a laptop (which is what I used, and is natural with a dock). The compression will ramp up the CPU load on the laptop, the ventilator will get noisy, and the display content was choppy too. It's definitely not the smooth experience you expect from 60 Hz. I guess DL can provide very good results with a laptop for use-cases with mostly static content: reading documents, spreadsheets, word, etc. Just don't expect to have a nice experience when most of the screen content changes quickly. So I returned my DL USB-C dock, bought a super cheap one as actually I only have a 1440pt external screen for which any cheap dock will support true 60 Hz, and I have a nice experience. For 60 Hz with 4k it'll have to wait, and it won't be with DL as far as I'm concerned. [1] https://github.com/AdnanHodzic/displaylink-debian https://github.com/AdnanHodzic/displaylink-debian
pandada8 7y ago
Dell's DA300 can do 4k 60Hz with DP1.4 though. And intel added dp1.4 support starting with Ice Lake.
bgorman 7y ago
Great article. I was recently wading through this problem for my work setup. I was going crazy wondering what the actual technical limitations were with USB-C vs Displayport over USB-C versus Thunderbolt. I ended getting this WAVLINK dock for $150 with Thunderbolt 3. If you want Dual 4k montiors and USB 3 output + power for your laptop I recommend this. https://www.amazon.com/WAVLINK-DisplayPort-Thunderbolt-Charging-Ethernet/dp/B07T2RW54X https://www.amazon.com/WAVLINK-DisplayPort-Thunderbolt-Charg...
- bloopernova 7y ago
  I got one of these for just the 2 DisplayPort outputs: https://smile.amazon.com/Cable-Matters-Thunderbolt-DisplayPort-Supporting/dp/B01DYFI1OE/ https://smile.amazon.com/Cable-Matters-Thunderbolt-DisplayPo... Then bought one of these from a coworker for $40 to drive all the other ports. I've been pretty lucky. (all being driven by a 2018 macbook pro) https://smile.amazon.com/Docking-Station-Laptop-Power-Delivery/dp/B07MCVY29J/ https://smile.amazon.com/Docking-Station-Laptop-Power-Delive... The first dongle is driving 2 Dell 23" 1080 screens, my 27" 4K screen is driven directly by a thunderbolt to displayport cable, and all my USB stuff goes through the second dongle. It works really well so far, and I have an upgrade path for 2 more 4K screens with the Cable Matters dongle. Yours is an all-in-one that really looks nice though. How warm does it get?
  - bgorman 7y ago
    It is a little bit warm, but nothing concerning. I can leave my hand on it no problem.
    - bloopernova 7y ago
      Thank you, that's my experience with the USB-C hub that I'm using. I kind of wish it wasn't tucked out of the way behind monitors, then I could use it as a hand warmer :)
Eric_WVGG 7y ago
I saw this headline and was briefly excited for a moment that a USB-C hub finally existed. That is, a device like an ethernet hub or a USB hub, that would turn one port into several other ports of the same kind. This is an article about USB-C port replicators. Four years into this and not a real single USB-C hub exists. I’ve never seen such a botched rollout.
- nikanj 7y ago
  I've been told the USB-C spec doesn't allow for hubs like that.
  - angrygoat 7y ago
    It's quite a strange design choice: I can plug in the stuff I need when working at my desk (USB 2 keyboard, a couple of external drives, USB-C SSD, monitor) into my Mac only because I have a USB-C to USB 3 hub; but surely down the track more and more of my devices will be native USB-C... at which point I won't have enough ports to plug them all in?
  - cesarb 7y ago
    I've looked at the USB-C spec, and it does allow for hubs like that. The USB 2.0 and USB 3.x parts of the hub are the same as for non-USB-C hubs, and the USB-PD standard even has an example with a 3-port USB-C hub at the end.
  - ProZsolt 7y ago
    That's not true. The spec allows it but currently, there's no chip that supports it.
- garmaine 7y ago
  USB-C hubs are not permitted by the spec.
  - hvidgaard 7y ago
    But why?
nrp 7y ago
This issue was the genesis of the short-lived VirtualLink effort: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VirtualLink https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VirtualLink VR headsets wanted four lanes of DisplayPort, USB 3.1 for data, and power over a single connector, and no existing standard supported that.
- snops 7y ago
  Interesting how you say short lived, I had a look and it's on founders edition NVidia RTX2000 series cards, though not mandatory [1] and Valve recently cancelled support for it on the Index headset. [2] Do you think it will be cancelled on the next series of cards? The need for yet another specialised variant of USB-C cables does look a downside for me, vs DisplayPort getting fast enough to need only two lanes for VR, so standard cables can be used. [1] https://uploadvr.com/nvidia-rtx-super-virtuallink/ https://uploadvr.com/nvidia-rtx-super-virtuallink/ [2] https://www.roadtovr.com/valve-index-virtuallink-adapter-canceled/ https://www.roadtovr.com/valve-index-virtuallink-adapter-can...
- flafla2 7y ago
  > Unlike most alt-mode; this will also remap A7, A6, B6, B7 to carry USB 3.0 signal, instead of the usual passive USB 2.0 signal. This means that one will not be able to extend the cable using a standard USB-C 3.0 cable, which has these pins mapped only for unshielded USB 2.0 signals. Also this will require the VirtualLink port to also detect the correct orientation of the USB-C plug to ensure that the USB 3.0 TX and RX lanes are correctly connected. A fun/interesting hack! But breaking superposition is a huge dealbreaker. Imagine seeing notices in software saying to flip your cable upside down...
  - whoopdedo 7y ago
    Why couldn't the connections be swappable electronically inside the connector? The way that modern Ethernet ports adapt to the correct Rx/Tx without needing a crossover cable.
- cesarb 7y ago
  I personally believe VirtualLink is dead. Its use case (four-lane DisplayPort and USB 3.x at the same time) is also met by USB4, which I believe will be more widely implemented. However, I also believe that the VirtualLink trick of repurposing the USB 2.0 pins will end up being used by a future USB standard for two more lanes of USB4, gaining 50% more speed without reducing even more the maximum cable length.
chx 7y ago
So many wrongs in this article. > To keep a 60 Hz refresh rate, you need to step down to 2K or lower resolution. Nope. 3440 x 1440 @ 60Hz is the highest res currently used which still fits half the bandwidth of DP 1.2, see here: https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/729232-guide-to-display-cables-adapters-v2/?section=calc&H=3440&V=1440&F=60&timing=cvtrb&calculations=show&formulas=show https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/729232-guide-to-display... > They are very likely DisplayPort Alternate Mode designs using four lanes. If a hub claims to support 4K @ 60Hz and USB 3.0 it doesn't necessarily mean it supports both at the same time. It can be convenient to have a flexible hub which, when connected to a monitor where two lanes are enough then USB 3.0 is provided, if you go above then it slows down to USB 2.0. At least one of the hubs linked from the article (very small with one power, one USB 3, one HDMI and a non-captive cable) is such, this was confirmed by one of the sellers, this device is available with many, many labels. The article also omits that many, many notebooks with a single Thunderbolt 3 port will not support multiple 4K @ 60Hz because they put only four DisplayPort lanes in there using a cheaper, lower power controller called the Alpine Ridge LP. And yes, that pos is still in use despite I hoped Titan Ridge will deprecate it. Dual port Thunderbolt controllers are all full bandwidth, single can be half or full. Hard to tell without looking up the TB controller used in the device on social media / stackexchange etc -- the manufacturers are often quite tight lipped on the topic. Another fun fact: while the Thunderbolt 3 bus is indeed 40gbps, that's only filled out when video is used, the data speed is nerfed to 22gbps by all existing controllers. Dell admits this in one article https://www.dell.com/support/article/us/en/19/sln307875/thunderbolt-3-usb-c-maximum-data-transfer-rate-on-dell-systems?lang=en https://www.dell.com/support/article/us/en/19/sln307875/thun... > Thunderbolt 3 may only reach a maximum data transfer rate of around 7 to 22Gbps even though it is advertised with 40Gbps but this is so rare, every other article, even the one linked from this rare gem of truth claims some baloney like "Systems with 4 lane design will support up to 40gbps of data transfer over PCIe" which is obviously not true because even without nerfing PCIe 3.0 x4 is 32gbps only but it is nerfed. The official TB3 brief also tells you this but a little overt because it is never stated in the text but Figure 7 shows what's up in https://thunderbolttechnology.net/sites/default/files/Thunderbolt3_TechBrief_FINAL.pdf https://thunderbolttechnology.net/sites/default/files/Thunde... And make no mistake, there are only PCIe and DisplayPort signals on the TB3 bus, there are no USB signals, the TB3 controller in the dock provides a USB root hub. Someone should bring a class action lawsuit to Intel and practically all laptop makers for false advertising in this... (Side note: USB 4 will be different in the signals, if my understanding is correct then the Thunderbolt 3-like bus which is an optional mode for USB 4 will finally contain PCIe, DP and USB signals.) I have written similar explanations in the past for eg https://www.reddit.com/r/thinkpad/wiki/newdocks https://www.reddit.com/r/thinkpad/wiki/newdocks https://superuser.com/a/1200112/41259 https://superuser.com/a/1200112/41259
Nextgrid 7y ago
The USB-C spec is an insane mess. The fact that every port used to be different is actually a feature, as it helps you identify which device supports what based on the ports it had. If you see an HDMI port on a laptop you can be sure it's going to output some kind of video signal over that. If you see Thunderbolt then you're sure the machine supports Thunderbolt. USB-C just jams all these incompatible standards into a pin-count-constrained port (so they can't even all fit in, and trade-offs need to be made) without any way for the user to tell nor select which features should be enabled on which port. My 12-inch MacBook for example has a USB-C port just like the MacBook Air and Pro, and yet if I plug in a Thunderbolt Display it won't work on the 12-inch one but will on the Air and Pro. As a user there is no easy way for me to tell the 12-inch Macbook's USB-C port is different than the Air/Pro unless you explicitly search for it in the tech specs (which is counter-intuitive as the whole point of USB-C is to be universal so in an ideal world you wouldn't/shouldn't even think about searching that).
- dheera 7y ago
  Not only that, but the USB-C plug itself is the worst-designed plug I have seen in a decade. It's flimsy sheet metal on the plug side with a nice big cantilever, and flimsy sheet metal soldered to a PCB on the other. Perfect recipe for broken ports and cables. I break about a cable a week and break a device every now and then. Mostly doing very normal things like charging a phone in my pocket while hiking. USB-C seems like a perfect example of a product designed by people who sit in an office chair all day and never go hiking, skiing, ice skating, rock climbing, or otherwise seek to understand what their users normally do with plugged-in devices in the field. I miss the old DC barrel connectors -- they never broke, and they were usually designed such that housing of the electronics took the brunt of everything, not the PCB.
  - mantoto 7y ago
    That's just bullshit. You can check for how many uses a usbc plug was designed and tested for.
    - dheera 7y ago
nrclark 7y ago
USB-C is a train-wreck for those of us who work in electronics design. USB-C's chipset support isn't all that good, it seems like. With USB 3 type A, you pretty-much just run your USB lines to the ports on your CPU. Simple, straightforward. Manufacturers are happy to do it, because it's dirt cheap and requires nothing except the connectors and maybe some ESD protection. USB-C is a different beast entirely. Just to use the USB 3 lanes, you need to put down a high-speed mux just to deal with both connector orientations. Want to support USB Power delivery (transmitting or receiving)? That'll be another set of chips to put onto the board. Plus software to deal with the PD negotiation. Want to support Displayport? That'll be _another_ mux chip. Plus more software to advertise the functionality. The cables are also much harder to manufacture, and this is reflected in their average price after you chop off one or two outliers. Is your item a USB host? A device? Does it accept or provide power over USB? Does it support Displayport? Thunderbolt? Analog audio? Something else entirely? There's no way to know from looking at the connector. And no standardized markings that I've ever seen.
- BiteCode_dev 7y ago
  I'm completely ok with it being complicated to design and cost 10 euros more if it delivers. And despite all its flaws, USBC does. It's small. It's reversible. I can charge all my devices on it: my samsung tablet, my oneplus phone, my logitech mouse, my jabra headphones, my switch and my XPS 13 laptop, which I can also dock to my screen/ethernet. It's amazing. So yes, I had to take the time to find the proper cable, and I bought a few before finding brands I can trust to work with all my machines... and not fry them. It sucks, but it will improve with time, like it did with early USB and HDMI (too many people forgot how terrible THAT was). It already has, in fact, improved a lot, and it will keep it up. Meanwhile, I have only one cable and one dongle in my bag that do everything. I don't even have to get them out most of the time. This is imperfect. This needs fixing. But this is better than what we had before. Way better.
  - janlaureys 7y ago
    I'm soon switching a lot of things to USB-C. What brands of cables would you recommend ?
asutekku 7y ago
There's a lot of complaining from the engineering side regarding the USB-C but for the customer it is godsend. Now instead of million little different ports, they can use one which in well-engineered (emphasis here) products will cover most of their use cases. Yes, I know it is a pain to manufacture and design software for but the user doesn't care about that. They care about convenience.
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sgt 7y ago
Although a hub is useful, it's worth dedicating one of your USB-C / thunderbolt ports to running your external screen, especially if you can't afford a good hub at the moment. I use a DP to USB-C cable on my MacBook Pro. As the article points out, it's not worth bothering with HDMI as you'll easily end up with 30Hz at 4k. 30Hz is absolutely unbearable, and I think most developers buying a new screen now will invest in a good 4K monitor. Note about my setup: I then run 3008x1692 (2560x1440 is also good) scaled resolution on my 4K monitor as the full 3840x2160 resolution will make everything extremely small. Everything is crisp and running at a beautiful 60Hz.
ChrisMarshallNY 7y ago
I was reading the comments, and saw my exact issue with USB-C reflected there. I use a Thunderbolt hub (TS3), and I drive a 5120 X 1440 Big Ol' Honker display. The display has a USBC port, but if I use it, the resolution drops. I learned to unplug the USBC port, and just use the DisplayPort. If I do that, the display works great. Full width at 60Hz. It's not a gaming rig, so that's fine for me.
treyfitty 7y ago
Last night, I was ready to pull my hair out trying to figure out what dock + cable I need, so this article is quite the blessing. However, I’m still left confused on whether I need a USB3.1 usb-c cable or Thunderbolt 3 cable. In light of the MBP16 announcement, I wanted to plan my purchase, including the peripherals. I currently have 2 4K monitors on a PC. I’d still like to use that PC from time to time, but it’d be convenient to do so through a dock. Enter the Targus dock that I happen to have received through work (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07BPQKP8V/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_0buZDbZSW5P8M https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07BPQKP8V/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_0b...) which claims to be Thunderbolt 3 “compatible.” However, none of their ports are specced to be such. Furthermore, the included host attachment USB-C up cable is only capable of transferring 5GB/s instead of the 40GB/s a la Thunderbolt 3. Now, this article explains DisplayLink nicely, but what happens when I use the Targus Dock with and without a Thunderbolt 3 cable? Does it bypass DisplayLink and just go directly to the dual 4K monitors at 60hz? Or does it still fall victim of CPU overhead due to processing DisplayLink?
- bloopernova 7y ago
  I've wished for a universal thunderbolt/usb diagnostic widget or software for just these sorts of issues. I wonder how many problems like this could be solved if people just had a bit more information about which ports supported which standards?
Derbasti 7y ago
Let's talk power: The USB-C PD charger of my Nintendo Switch does not charge my phone, but it does charge my Surface. My phone's USB-C charger does charge the phone and Surface, but not the Switch. My USB-C battery pack charges my phone, but is charged by my Surface. Yeah, it just works. How do, say, a battery pack and a Surface negotiate who is charging who over a symmetric USB-C-to-C cable?
- ben-schaaf 7y ago
  On the topic of power, I really don't understand how USB-C is supposed to replace charging cables. USB-C is limited to 100W. That's enough for a switch, phone or low power laptop, but if this[0] is anything to go by the 6 core intel laptop CPUs already eats 80W of power. Add an extra 2 cores and you might not even be able to sustain a CPU load without draining the battery. Not to mention much higher power draw GPUs. My real question here is what's the plan? Because it's not possible to push 200-300W down a USB-C cable. [0] https://www.techspot.com/review/1847-intel-core-i7-9750h-vs-8750h/ https://www.techspot.com/review/1847-intel-core-i7-9750h-vs-...
  - MaddAgent 7y ago
    So you're thinking the new MacBook Pro 16 with an 8 Core CPU and a GPU using the included 96Watt USB-C charger may drain the battery under full load?
    - rhinoceraptor 7y ago
      It will drain the battery at full load, the i9 is a 45 watt TDP and the RX 5500M is 85 watt TDP (plus display, ram, disk, etc). However, there's no way the cooling on the laptop can support that much power draw, so I'd expect it to throttle itself way before you'd drain the battery while plugged in.
  - rhinoceraptor 7y ago
    Big gaming laptops will always require big power supplies, probably using barrel jacks. I've seen really gigantic ones that use two! But pretty much every other laptop can get away with well under 100 watts. I use a 30 watt USB C charger at home, and it's fine for using my 15" i7/560X MBP at my desk, because I'm not running it at 100% CPU/GPU for extended periods.
kkarakk 7y ago
i used to think usb c was awesome and would lead to a 1 wire for everything world. Now i have 4 different kinds of usb c wire i need depending on usecase - passive usb c for charging my headphones since they didn't implement a resistor, active usb c for charging laptop,usb c for charging mobile(fast charging),usb c for data transfer/thunderbolt/video display what a disaster of a spec
- ProZsolt 7y ago
  The spec isn't a disaster. Vendors implementing is. The main problem is that OEMs don't give a sh*t about the spec and cutting corners whenever they can.
  - kkarakk 7y ago
    The spec should require clear labelling of SOME kind to differentiate between the different types of wires. I feel like that's been a common issue with the USB spec and one they refuse to address
oflannabhra 7y ago
As much as people complain about USB-C, I absolutely love it. I have a 2018 MacBook Pro, and I use the Caldigit TS3 hub (referenced in the article) as my docking station at work. I plug a single cable in, and I immediately have 2 x 27" 4k monitors, power, USB peripherals, headphones, Ethernet, and much more if I need it. I travel with a single dongle that cost $15: SD card, HDMI, 2xUSB 2. I have not had to buy any extra cables, besides what came with the computer.
- bradstewart 7y ago
  When you find a computer/dock/cable combination that works, it's fantastic. But, in my experience, it's extremely hit or miss whether a different monitor, or laptop, or cable will work with other components. Particularly with 4k@60Hz.

Interesting! Was wondering about this recently when shopping for a USB-C hub, and couldn't find many that supported 4K@60hz. Ended up getting one that does 30hz because my Display at home is only 1440p. I have used Displaylink adapters before (have one floating around somewhere), and was not super impressed (my machine was a bit flaky when using it), although I did have 2 external displays going on my Macbook at one point (this was before the days of multiple Displayports on Macbooks), which was kind of fun.

greggman2 7y ago
I went through 3 of them before finding one that worked (the first was buying before I knew the issue existed. The second was being impatient). I'm using this one on a Macbook Air. (https://www.hypershop.com/products/hyperdrive-duo-hub-for-usb-c-macbook-pro-13-and-15-2016-2017-2018 https://www.hypershop.com/products/hyperdrive-duo-hub-for-us...). I'd prefer one that used a single USB-C connection (assuming that's possible) and that used a cable so it was useful for more than just the couple of devices that have 2 USB-C ports exactly that far apart but at the time, a year ago, that was one of the few choices. The good thing is it does work and I have it on 4k@60hz

adeeds 7y ago

I wish I had come across this article when I was looking for a dock for my MBP (connected to a pair of 4k monitors). It was a pain to try and figure out if I'd be able to get 60hz video from a particular docking station. I went with the Caldigit one and luckily it worked. It's nice to learn why.

craftinator 7y ago

I'm actually a bit confused by why it matters at this point. HDMI is ubiquitous, can handle a high enough resolution/ rate that most human eyes can't distinguish better, and is relatively cheap. It's an optimized, widely available format, and does a great job. USB is a downgrade for this particular task. Other than novelty, I don't see a reason to ever do this.

SlowRobotAhead 7y ago
If I were to guess, I would say it comes down to the U in USB, and power delivery.
NullPrefix 7y ago
>can handle a high enough resolution/ rate that most human eyes can't distinguish better Could you specify which resolution and refresh rate that is? Are we still talking about 1080p or this is higher?
greggman2 7y ago
What do you mean? Plenty of computers now ship with no other connectors than USB-C. In other words HDMI is not ubiquitous What I love about USB-C is I plug in a single cable to my laptop and I get keyboard, mouse, wifi, and monitor (4k 60hz) At work I have a USB-C hub for my one cable to my computer. The hub has Displayport so I can use HDMI on a different device. At home my monitor does USB-C natively so my keyboard and mouse are plugged into that.
- Shorel 7y ago
  > Plenty of computers now ship with no other connectors than USB-C. In other words HDMI is not ubiquitous Sadly. Mine has USB-C and HDMI. I don't think I will buy a device without HDMI in the next 15 years.
hobofromabroad 7y ago
For instance: a lot of us want one cable to connect display, keyboard, mouse, power to the laptop (aka some device)?
garmaine 7y ago
You are getting down-voted because you didn't read the article.
sannee 7y ago
Oh you sweet summer child. If you want to buy a laptop these days, you have to shell out 300$ for what is basically half of the motherboard and connect it externally over USB-C.

SlowRobotAhead 7y ago

Entertaining read. What a blunder the USB group has made with v3.x, it’ll all work out and eventually be awesome when every port and every cable just works and things charge fast but, almost every major feature of USB has had issues going back to first release. More reviews and articles should have a liars section.

wavesquid 7y ago

The HP ZBook Dock with Thunderbolt 3 tends to be on ebay for around US$50 and should do 4K 60Hz.

donatj 7y ago
What are the odds one will work with a MacBook Pro?
phire 7y ago
Avoid that one. There is a reason why it's so cheap on ebay. Sure, it's a Thunderbolt 3 dock, but the two displayport ports aren't using thuderbolt 3. The are actually connected via USB displaylink.
- _trampeltier 7y ago
  Uh, yes. Avoid that one. We have ZBooks and these Docks at work and we all have all kind of troubles. But the funny thing is, we all have different troubles. Mostly the keyboard or one or two monitors does not work ..

fulafel 7y ago

re "Driver availability and compatibility for Mac/Linux is spotty to non-existent": Is it true that DisplayLink doesn't work well with Linux? Some years ago people were saying that the usb-to-monitor dongles worked well. A casual web search also gives this impression, with good support provided by the DisplayLink company.

jankotek 7y ago
I use display-link dongle as port of USB-C docking station. It plugs and unplugs well, but driver uses a lot of cpu and there is no graphic acceleration. Not sure if would handl 4k video. Great for IDE.
yaantc 7y ago
You can make Display Link (DL) work with Linux, there are drivers from the vendor and an adaptation script for Debian based distros [1] (and variants for others IIRC). You may have to fiddle with the configuration to avoid issues like minor display corruptions or cursor glitches. I made it work clean once, but in the end I returned the dock. DL is to me a bad idea, except is some specific cases. The way DL works is that a driver on your PC creates a virtual frame per screen, composed on your PC. Then this screen(s) content is compressed and send to the dock DL chip using a proprietary driver. The chip on the dock reconstructs full images and send that to locally attached screen(s) using local HDMI or DisplayPort interfaces. Now yes, those local interface(s) may run at 60 Hz and be 4k. But the bottleneck is not there, it is in the compression and transmission over the USB link. In my experience, any use-cases with large changing content (e.g.: full screen video) will give a bad experience on a laptop (which is what I used, and is natural with a dock). The compression will ramp up the CPU load on the laptop, the ventilator will get noisy, and the display content was choppy too. It's definitely not the smooth experience you expect from 60 Hz. I guess DL can provide very good results with a laptop for use-cases with mostly static content: reading documents, spreadsheets, word, etc. Just don't expect to have a nice experience when most of the screen content changes quickly. So I returned my DL USB-C dock, bought a super cheap one as actually I only have a 1440pt external screen for which any cheap dock will support true 60 Hz, and I have a nice experience. For 60 Hz with 4k it'll have to wait, and it won't be with DL as far as I'm concerned. [1] https://github.com/AdnanHodzic/displaylink-debian https://github.com/AdnanHodzic/displaylink-debian

pandada8 7y ago

Dell's DA300 can do 4k 60Hz with DP1.4 though. And intel added dp1.4 support starting with Ice Lake.

bgorman 7y ago

Great article. I was recently wading through this problem for my work setup. I was going crazy wondering what the actual technical limitations were with USB-C vs Displayport over USB-C versus Thunderbolt. I ended getting this WAVLINK dock for $150 with Thunderbolt 3. If you want Dual 4k montiors and USB 3 output + power for your laptop I recommend this. https://www.amazon.com/WAVLINK-DisplayPort-Thunderbolt-Charging-Ethernet/dp/B07T2RW54X https://www.amazon.com/WAVLINK-DisplayPort-Thunderbolt-Charg...

bloopernova 7y ago
I got one of these for just the 2 DisplayPort outputs: https://smile.amazon.com/Cable-Matters-Thunderbolt-DisplayPort-Supporting/dp/B01DYFI1OE/ https://smile.amazon.com/Cable-Matters-Thunderbolt-DisplayPo... Then bought one of these from a coworker for $40 to drive all the other ports. I've been pretty lucky. (all being driven by a 2018 macbook pro) https://smile.amazon.com/Docking-Station-Laptop-Power-Delivery/dp/B07MCVY29J/ https://smile.amazon.com/Docking-Station-Laptop-Power-Delive... The first dongle is driving 2 Dell 23" 1080 screens, my 27" 4K screen is driven directly by a thunderbolt to displayport cable, and all my USB stuff goes through the second dongle. It works really well so far, and I have an upgrade path for 2 more 4K screens with the Cable Matters dongle. Yours is an all-in-one that really looks nice though. How warm does it get?
- bgorman 7y ago
  It is a little bit warm, but nothing concerning. I can leave my hand on it no problem.
  - bloopernova 7y ago
    Thank you, that's my experience with the USB-C hub that I'm using. I kind of wish it wasn't tucked out of the way behind monitors, then I could use it as a hand warmer :)

Eric_WVGG 7y ago

I saw this headline and was briefly excited for a moment that a USB-C hub finally existed. That is, a device like an ethernet hub or a USB hub, that would turn one port into several other ports of the same kind. This is an article about USB-C port replicators. Four years into this and not a real single USB-C hub exists. I’ve never seen such a botched rollout.

nikanj 7y ago
I've been told the USB-C spec doesn't allow for hubs like that.
- angrygoat 7y ago
  It's quite a strange design choice: I can plug in the stuff I need when working at my desk (USB 2 keyboard, a couple of external drives, USB-C SSD, monitor) into my Mac only because I have a USB-C to USB 3 hub; but surely down the track more and more of my devices will be native USB-C... at which point I won't have enough ports to plug them all in?
- cesarb 7y ago
  I've looked at the USB-C spec, and it does allow for hubs like that. The USB 2.0 and USB 3.x parts of the hub are the same as for non-USB-C hubs, and the USB-PD standard even has an example with a 3-port USB-C hub at the end.
- ProZsolt 7y ago
  That's not true. The spec allows it but currently, there's no chip that supports it.
garmaine 7y ago
USB-C hubs are not permitted by the spec.
- hvidgaard 7y ago
  But why?

nrp 7y ago

This issue was the genesis of the short-lived VirtualLink effort: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VirtualLink https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VirtualLink VR headsets wanted four lanes of DisplayPort, USB 3.1 for data, and power over a single connector, and no existing standard supported that.

snops 7y ago
Interesting how you say short lived, I had a look and it's on founders edition NVidia RTX2000 series cards, though not mandatory [1] and Valve recently cancelled support for it on the Index headset. [2] Do you think it will be cancelled on the next series of cards? The need for yet another specialised variant of USB-C cables does look a downside for me, vs DisplayPort getting fast enough to need only two lanes for VR, so standard cables can be used. [1] https://uploadvr.com/nvidia-rtx-super-virtuallink/ https://uploadvr.com/nvidia-rtx-super-virtuallink/ [2] https://www.roadtovr.com/valve-index-virtuallink-adapter-canceled/ https://www.roadtovr.com/valve-index-virtuallink-adapter-can...
flafla2 7y ago
> Unlike most alt-mode; this will also remap A7, A6, B6, B7 to carry USB 3.0 signal, instead of the usual passive USB 2.0 signal. This means that one will not be able to extend the cable using a standard USB-C 3.0 cable, which has these pins mapped only for unshielded USB 2.0 signals. Also this will require the VirtualLink port to also detect the correct orientation of the USB-C plug to ensure that the USB 3.0 TX and RX lanes are correctly connected. A fun/interesting hack! But breaking superposition is a huge dealbreaker. Imagine seeing notices in software saying to flip your cable upside down...
- whoopdedo 7y ago
  Why couldn't the connections be swappable electronically inside the connector? The way that modern Ethernet ports adapt to the correct Rx/Tx without needing a crossover cable.
cesarb 7y ago
I personally believe VirtualLink is dead. Its use case (four-lane DisplayPort and USB 3.x at the same time) is also met by USB4, which I believe will be more widely implemented. However, I also believe that the VirtualLink trick of repurposing the USB 2.0 pins will end up being used by a future USB standard for two more lanes of USB4, gaining 50% more speed without reducing even more the maximum cable length.

chx 7y ago

So many wrongs in this article. > To keep a 60 Hz refresh rate, you need to step down to 2K or lower resolution. Nope. 3440 x 1440 @ 60Hz is the highest res currently used which still fits half the bandwidth of DP 1.2, see here: https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/729232-guide-to-display-cables-adapters-v2/?section=calc&H=3440&V=1440&F=60&timing=cvtrb&calculations=show&formulas=show https://linustechtips.com/main/topic/729232-guide-to-display... > They are very likely DisplayPort Alternate Mode designs using four lanes. If a hub claims to support 4K @ 60Hz and USB 3.0 it doesn't necessarily mean it supports both at the same time. It can be convenient to have a flexible hub which, when connected to a monitor where two lanes are enough then USB 3.0 is provided, if you go above then it slows down to USB 2.0. At least one of the hubs linked from the article (very small with one power, one USB 3, one HDMI and a non-captive cable) is such, this was confirmed by one of the sellers, this device is available with many, many labels. The article also omits that many, many notebooks with a single Thunderbolt 3 port will not support multiple 4K @ 60Hz because they put only four DisplayPort lanes in there using a cheaper, lower power controller called the Alpine Ridge LP. And yes, that pos is still in use despite I hoped Titan Ridge will deprecate it. Dual port Thunderbolt controllers are all full bandwidth, single can be half or full. Hard to tell without looking up the TB controller used in the device on social media / stackexchange etc -- the manufacturers are often quite tight lipped on the topic. Another fun fact: while the Thunderbolt 3 bus is indeed 40gbps, that's only filled out when video is used, the data speed is nerfed to 22gbps by all existing controllers. Dell admits this in one article https://www.dell.com/support/article/us/en/19/sln307875/thunderbolt-3-usb-c-maximum-data-transfer-rate-on-dell-systems?lang=en https://www.dell.com/support/article/us/en/19/sln307875/thun... > Thunderbolt 3 may only reach a maximum data transfer rate of around 7 to 22Gbps even though it is advertised with 40Gbps but this is so rare, every other article, even the one linked from this rare gem of truth claims some baloney like "Systems with 4 lane design will support up to 40gbps of data transfer over PCIe" which is obviously not true because even without nerfing PCIe 3.0 x4 is 32gbps only but it is nerfed. The official TB3 brief also tells you this but a little overt because it is never stated in the text but Figure 7 shows what's up in https://thunderbolttechnology.net/sites/default/files/Thunderbolt3_TechBrief_FINAL.pdf https://thunderbolttechnology.net/sites/default/files/Thunde... And make no mistake, there are only PCIe and DisplayPort signals on the TB3 bus, there are no USB signals, the TB3 controller in the dock provides a USB root hub. Someone should bring a class action lawsuit to Intel and practically all laptop makers for false advertising in this... (Side note: USB 4 will be different in the signals, if my understanding is correct then the Thunderbolt 3-like bus which is an optional mode for USB 4 will finally contain PCIe, DP and USB signals.) I have written similar explanations in the past for eg https://www.reddit.com/r/thinkpad/wiki/newdocks https://www.reddit.com/r/thinkpad/wiki/newdocks https://superuser.com/a/1200112/41259 https://superuser.com/a/1200112/41259

Nextgrid 7y ago

The USB-C spec is an insane mess. The fact that every port used to be different is actually a feature, as it helps you identify which device supports what based on the ports it had. If you see an HDMI port on a laptop you can be sure it's going to output some kind of video signal over that. If you see Thunderbolt then you're sure the machine supports Thunderbolt. USB-C just jams all these incompatible standards into a pin-count-constrained port (so they can't even all fit in, and trade-offs need to be made) without any way for the user to tell nor select which features should be enabled on which port. My 12-inch MacBook for example has a USB-C port just like the MacBook Air and Pro, and yet if I plug in a Thunderbolt Display it won't work on the 12-inch one but will on the Air and Pro. As a user there is no easy way for me to tell the 12-inch Macbook's USB-C port is different than the Air/Pro unless you explicitly search for it in the tech specs (which is counter-intuitive as the whole point of USB-C is to be universal so in an ideal world you wouldn't/shouldn't even think about searching that).

dheera 7y ago
Not only that, but the USB-C plug itself is the worst-designed plug I have seen in a decade. It's flimsy sheet metal on the plug side with a nice big cantilever, and flimsy sheet metal soldered to a PCB on the other. Perfect recipe for broken ports and cables. I break about a cable a week and break a device every now and then. Mostly doing very normal things like charging a phone in my pocket while hiking. USB-C seems like a perfect example of a product designed by people who sit in an office chair all day and never go hiking, skiing, ice skating, rock climbing, or otherwise seek to understand what their users normally do with plugged-in devices in the field. I miss the old DC barrel connectors -- they never broke, and they were usually designed such that housing of the electronics took the brunt of everything, not the PCB.
- mantoto 7y ago
  That's just bullshit. You can check for how many uses a usbc plug was designed and tested for.
  - dheera 7y ago

nrclark 7y ago

USB-C is a train-wreck for those of us who work in electronics design. USB-C's chipset support isn't all that good, it seems like. With USB 3 type A, you pretty-much just run your USB lines to the ports on your CPU. Simple, straightforward. Manufacturers are happy to do it, because it's dirt cheap and requires nothing except the connectors and maybe some ESD protection. USB-C is a different beast entirely. Just to use the USB 3 lanes, you need to put down a high-speed mux just to deal with both connector orientations. Want to support USB Power delivery (transmitting or receiving)? That'll be another set of chips to put onto the board. Plus software to deal with the PD negotiation. Want to support Displayport? That'll be _another_ mux chip. Plus more software to advertise the functionality. The cables are also much harder to manufacture, and this is reflected in their average price after you chop off one or two outliers. Is your item a USB host? A device? Does it accept or provide power over USB? Does it support Displayport? Thunderbolt? Analog audio? Something else entirely? There's no way to know from looking at the connector. And no standardized markings that I've ever seen.

BiteCode_dev 7y ago
I'm completely ok with it being complicated to design and cost 10 euros more if it delivers. And despite all its flaws, USBC does. It's small. It's reversible. I can charge all my devices on it: my samsung tablet, my oneplus phone, my logitech mouse, my jabra headphones, my switch and my XPS 13 laptop, which I can also dock to my screen/ethernet. It's amazing. So yes, I had to take the time to find the proper cable, and I bought a few before finding brands I can trust to work with all my machines... and not fry them. It sucks, but it will improve with time, like it did with early USB and HDMI (too many people forgot how terrible THAT was). It already has, in fact, improved a lot, and it will keep it up. Meanwhile, I have only one cable and one dongle in my bag that do everything. I don't even have to get them out most of the time. This is imperfect. This needs fixing. But this is better than what we had before. Way better.
- janlaureys 7y ago
  I'm soon switching a lot of things to USB-C. What brands of cables would you recommend ?

asutekku 7y ago

There's a lot of complaining from the engineering side regarding the USB-C but for the customer it is godsend. Now instead of million little different ports, they can use one which in well-engineered (emphasis here) products will cover most of their use cases. Yes, I know it is a pain to manufacture and design software for but the user doesn't care about that. They care about convenience.

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sgt 7y ago

Although a hub is useful, it's worth dedicating one of your USB-C / thunderbolt ports to running your external screen, especially if you can't afford a good hub at the moment. I use a DP to USB-C cable on my MacBook Pro. As the article points out, it's not worth bothering with HDMI as you'll easily end up with 30Hz at 4k. 30Hz is absolutely unbearable, and I think most developers buying a new screen now will invest in a good 4K monitor. Note about my setup: I then run 3008x1692 (2560x1440 is also good) scaled resolution on my 4K monitor as the full 3840x2160 resolution will make everything extremely small. Everything is crisp and running at a beautiful 60Hz.

ChrisMarshallNY 7y ago

I was reading the comments, and saw my exact issue with USB-C reflected there. I use a Thunderbolt hub (TS3), and I drive a 5120 X 1440 Big Ol' Honker display. The display has a USBC port, but if I use it, the resolution drops. I learned to unplug the USBC port, and just use the DisplayPort. If I do that, the display works great. Full width at 60Hz. It's not a gaming rig, so that's fine for me.

treyfitty 7y ago

Last night, I was ready to pull my hair out trying to figure out what dock + cable I need, so this article is quite the blessing. However, I’m still left confused on whether I need a USB3.1 usb-c cable or Thunderbolt 3 cable. In light of the MBP16 announcement, I wanted to plan my purchase, including the peripherals. I currently have 2 4K monitors on a PC. I’d still like to use that PC from time to time, but it’d be convenient to do so through a dock. Enter the Targus dock that I happen to have received through work (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07BPQKP8V/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_0buZDbZSW5P8M https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07BPQKP8V/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_0b...) which claims to be Thunderbolt 3 “compatible.” However, none of their ports are specced to be such. Furthermore, the included host attachment USB-C up cable is only capable of transferring 5GB/s instead of the 40GB/s a la Thunderbolt 3. Now, this article explains DisplayLink nicely, but what happens when I use the Targus Dock with and without a Thunderbolt 3 cable? Does it bypass DisplayLink and just go directly to the dual 4K monitors at 60hz? Or does it still fall victim of CPU overhead due to processing DisplayLink?

bloopernova 7y ago
I've wished for a universal thunderbolt/usb diagnostic widget or software for just these sorts of issues. I wonder how many problems like this could be solved if people just had a bit more information about which ports supported which standards?

Derbasti 7y ago

Let's talk power: The USB-C PD charger of my Nintendo Switch does not charge my phone, but it does charge my Surface. My phone's USB-C charger does charge the phone and Surface, but not the Switch. My USB-C battery pack charges my phone, but is charged by my Surface. Yeah, it just works. How do, say, a battery pack and a Surface negotiate who is charging who over a symmetric USB-C-to-C cable?

ben-schaaf 7y ago
On the topic of power, I really don't understand how USB-C is supposed to replace charging cables. USB-C is limited to 100W. That's enough for a switch, phone or low power laptop, but if this[0] is anything to go by the 6 core intel laptop CPUs already eats 80W of power. Add an extra 2 cores and you might not even be able to sustain a CPU load without draining the battery. Not to mention much higher power draw GPUs. My real question here is what's the plan? Because it's not possible to push 200-300W down a USB-C cable. [0] https://www.techspot.com/review/1847-intel-core-i7-9750h-vs-8750h/ https://www.techspot.com/review/1847-intel-core-i7-9750h-vs-...
- MaddAgent 7y ago
  So you're thinking the new MacBook Pro 16 with an 8 Core CPU and a GPU using the included 96Watt USB-C charger may drain the battery under full load?
  - rhinoceraptor 7y ago
    It will drain the battery at full load, the i9 is a 45 watt TDP and the RX 5500M is 85 watt TDP (plus display, ram, disk, etc). However, there's no way the cooling on the laptop can support that much power draw, so I'd expect it to throttle itself way before you'd drain the battery while plugged in.
- rhinoceraptor 7y ago
  Big gaming laptops will always require big power supplies, probably using barrel jacks. I've seen really gigantic ones that use two! But pretty much every other laptop can get away with well under 100 watts. I use a 30 watt USB C charger at home, and it's fine for using my 15" i7/560X MBP at my desk, because I'm not running it at 100% CPU/GPU for extended periods.

kkarakk 7y ago

i used to think usb c was awesome and would lead to a 1 wire for everything world. Now i have 4 different kinds of usb c wire i need depending on usecase - passive usb c for charging my headphones since they didn't implement a resistor, active usb c for charging laptop,usb c for charging mobile(fast charging),usb c for data transfer/thunderbolt/video display what a disaster of a spec

ProZsolt 7y ago
The spec isn't a disaster. Vendors implementing is. The main problem is that OEMs don't give a sh*t about the spec and cutting corners whenever they can.
- kkarakk 7y ago
  The spec should require clear labelling of SOME kind to differentiate between the different types of wires. I feel like that's been a common issue with the USB spec and one they refuse to address

oflannabhra 7y ago

As much as people complain about USB-C, I absolutely love it. I have a 2018 MacBook Pro, and I use the Caldigit TS3 hub (referenced in the article) as my docking station at work. I plug a single cable in, and I immediately have 2 x 27" 4k monitors, power, USB peripherals, headphones, Ethernet, and much more if I need it. I travel with a single dongle that cost $15: SD card, HDMI, 2xUSB 2. I have not had to buy any extra cables, besides what came with the computer.

bradstewart 7y ago
When you find a computer/dock/cable combination that works, it's fantastic. But, in my experience, it's extremely hit or miss whether a different monitor, or laptop, or cable will work with other components. Particularly with 4k@60Hz.