More Mobile: Hubs and Docks (Premium)

I’m barely a month into my experiments with a more mobile home office computing setup, and I’ve already seen some interesting results. For example, I’m surprised to report that I’ve successfully transitioned to using a laptop as my primary work PC, something I wasn’t sure I’d ever be comfortable with, and certainly not this quickly. And I’m equally surprised that the experience of playing Xbox Series X games on a 15-inch portable display has been far less successful: I spent most of this weekend trying to get used to that configuration again and it’s just not working for me.

I’ve already written about my attempts to downsize my gaming hardware requirements, but I only mentioned using a portable display with the Xbox Series X in passing, so here’s a quick photo and yet another promise that I’ll be writing more about portable displays soon.

Here, I’d like to focus on transitioning from a Thunderbolt dock to a USB-C hub, because I feel that the latter will make more sense in the long run. But first …

Why?

If you’re already familiar with the “why” of this article series, you can skip to the next section. But I’ve had enough questions about this that I figured a recap was in order.

I first brought up the impetus behind these experiments in a Thurrott Premium newsletter a while back: with the kids pretty much out of the house—one has graduated from college and the other is in her second year and will likely get an apartment near her school sometime next year—my wife and I are preparing for the future. That future will include selling our house, which was too big when we moved into it in 2017, let alone today, and then … something. That latter bit is still a mystery of sorts.

But it shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone who knows that I spent at least one month of the 15 pre-pandemic years outside of the United States each year that our international experiences are both a cause and effect of a desire we have to split our time between different locations. And now that we can do that more effectively, we’re going to. We’re just not entirely sure what that will look like.

And it doesn’t always have to be the same thing every year either. We’ve talked about spending a full year in places like Washington D.C., Providence, Rhode Island, and elsewhere. About spending a month or two in a succession of cities we’ve always wanted to visit, but never have, combined with some favorites. And about something international: perhaps Mexico City or Lisbon, Portugal.

What we do know, what I have been planning for and working towards with this “More Mobile” stuff, is that life will almost certainly be a lot more mobile than it is now. There could be some period of time, perhaps several years, during which we don’t have a fixed base of any kind, a home like the one we have now that can accommodate too much stuff.

Obviously, the exact nature and timing of this future is still unclear. But in the meantime, my wife and I are decluttering the house, and I’m figuring out what it will be like to take my home office on the road, so to speak.

So let’s continue.

Of docks and hubs

I’m sure that many people who use a laptop every day with an external display simply plug the display and interact using the laptop’s keyboard and touchpad. I wish I could do that, but having experienced the first pangs of carpal tunnel many years back, I transitioned to ergonomic keyboards and mice and saved my career. Yes, I use a laptop’s built-in keyboard and touchpad when I’m traveling or when using the PC around the house. But that’s the exception, and most of my writing occurs with the desktop setup.

And that means that even a more mobile computing setup that’s based around a laptop will need some kind of a dock or hub, as most laptops don’t have enough ports to plug-in all the peripherals I need. And even if one did, unplugging them all when I want to use just the laptop, and then re-plugging them all back in afterwards, would be tedious.

And when it comes to hubs and docks, well, we have options. Maybe too many options. And there is some confusion over whether or how hubs and docks are in any way different from each other. From my perspective, a hub is a USB-C peripheral that’s powered by the PC you connect it to, and USB-C hubs tend to be quite portable. Docks typically attach to a USB-C port too, though there are versions with proprietary connectors. Regardless, a dock is something fixed—meaning you would typically leave it on a desk and not travel with it—that comes with its own power supply. As a result, docks are often more powerful than hubs, if you will, because they can theoretically connect with more peripherals and/or provide more advanced video capabilities, like the ability to drive one or more 4K external displays at 60 Hz.

As noted, I’ve been using a CalDigit TS3 Plus Thunderbolt 3 dock that Intel loaned me, and it’s an incredible peripheral, with enough power and ports to do everything I want and more. The only problem with it, aside from the fact that it’s not mine and will be shipped back eventually, is that it’s not particularly portable. It’s large and heavy, and it has an enormous power supply, and it’s not something I’d ever travel with. It’s also expensive.

As a result, I began researching USB-C hubs with the hope of finding a device that was portable but still offered all the connectivity I need. Ideally something that could optionally work with its own power supply.

And I once again ended up at The Wirecutter, which is quickly turning into a 21st-century version of Consumer Reports. I’ve come to really trust this source when it comes to consumer electronics, in particular, as I almost always agree with their recommendations when I’m familiar with the products in question. And perhaps not surprisingly, its top pick for Thunderbolt docks is the CalDigit TS3 Plus Thunderbolt 3 dock I’m already using. So I was curious to see what they had to say about USB hubs.

Their top pick for USB-C hubs is the Anker PowerExpand 8-in-1 USB-C PD 10Gbps Data Hub. It’s on the expensive side for a USB-C hub, at $89. But it has the additional features I want, like Ethernet, 85-watt pass-through power delivery, HDMI out, and the ability to drive one 4K display at 60 Hz. (Most USB-C hubs only hit 30 Hz.) And it of course provides all the USB connectivity one would expect here in 2021.

That pass-through power delivery is of particular interest since I can use the laptop’s power supply to power the laptop through the USB-C hub, meaning I don’t need two cables plugged into the laptop. But the USB-C hub also works without external power, of course, and it’s quite portable.

It’s also a lot less organized than the Thunderbolt dock, which looks like a tiny power PC with most of its ports on the rear, making for cleaner, off the back of the desk wire management. With the USB-C hub, the ports are on all four sides, so there are cables and dongles heading off in every direction. So it’s not ideal day-to-day. But it does seem to work well.

Except for one little issue, that is. The cable that extends from the hub to the PC is hard-wired into the hub, and it’s not very long, maybe 6-inches. But because the laptop is elevated off the table by a Nexstand Laptop Stand, its ports are more than 6 inches from the top of the table. So I jury-rigged the USB-C hub so that it’s suspended up in the stand, above the desk. Between that and the cables, it’s a bit unsightly.

Oddly, if I just sat the laptop on a stack of books or whatever, this setup might work a little better: the hub and its tangle of wires could sit behind the laptop and be out of sight. But that’s OK, it does work as-is. And I’m sure there will be stacks of books awaiting me wherever I go in the future.

Lightening the load

Before moving on, I wanted to quickly address a related issue I’ve been thinking about. That is, the dock/hub thing is only one area where I can downsize.

I love my Microsoft Sculpt Ergonomic keyboard and mouse set, and strongly recommend it to everyone. But it has one major downside: it requires a proprietary dongle, and if you lose or break that dongle, the keyboard and mouse can’t be used again. It also has one minor downside: that dongle is quite susceptible to interference, and so I often have to put it on the end of a USB extender to bring it closer to the keyboard and mouse, and away from the PC. So a Bluetooth-based ergonomic keyboard and mouse would be the better choice. If a great one existed. (It may. I am looking at the Logitech ERGO K860 Split Keyboard for Business, which works over Bluetooth or its own proprietary dongle, but it’s very expensive.)

At some point, I’d also like to own a laptop with a great built-in webcam so I can stop messing around with an external webcam. My current webcam, an Elgato Facecam, is a fricking nightmare because it refuses to remember my custom configuration and I have to manually recreate it before every single podcast. I hate it.

I will also need to replace my podcast rig—which consists of a Focusrite Scarlett Solo (2nd Gen) USB Audio Interface and a Heil PR 40 microphone with PL2T Boom Mount—because it’s big, awkward, and decidedly not portable. This is something I’ve been working on, actually, and if you followed my podcasting attempts during the August 2021 trip to Mexico, you may know that the Audio-Technica ATR2100x-USB Cardioid Dynamic Microphone I purchased did not work out very well for reasons that are still unclear (but probably power-related). Now I’m wondering if adding a powered USB-C hub to the mix will help make that microphone make sense. Maybe later.

More soon.