Kensington ThunderBolt 5 Dock for Mac!

[@cwaynefox]

No word from Kensington, so I couldn’t take a chance on whether they would actually fix this or not, and returned the dock. I’ll watch for a firmware update, and mention it here, but doubtful I’ll buy the dock again to try it out. Too many negatives for me

[@DirettoIZM]

Your videos are so down to earth and helpful - I'm so glad I found your channel!

[@cwaynefox]

thanks

[@DavidHarry]

Hi, Wayne. Immediate thumbs up for your disclosure and honestly right at the start of the video 👍 Cheers, Dave.

[@cwaynefox]

thanks

[@htnowpro]

I see the OWC thunderbolt 5 dock is in stock at B&H. You are probably already working it thru its paces. I am anxiously awaiting your review. Have a wonderful New Year.

[@cwaynefox]

@@htnowpro mine will be delivered on Thursday, should have a video by first of the week.

[@htnowpro]

Cool, you are on the cutting edge for docks. Really enjoy the information...it's rich in real word use case scenarios. Thank you.

[@cwaynefox]

thanks for the comment

[@CAMTechChris]

Nice work on the video Wayne. The upstream Pc input on the front is annoying enough to keep me away from this dock. Hopefully Caldigit has a TB5 dock right around the corner.

[@htnowpro]

It would be interesting to see the speeds from the IVANKY dock running through the new thunderbolt 5 dock. I'm just curious if the Kensington would play nice with the IVANKY dock since the Kensington doesn't play well with the thunderbolt 5 mac port.

[@ahgflyguy]

Also, passive (certified) 40 Gbps cables, so generally those under a meter in length, but definitely not the active TB4 cable used in this video, can carry the TB5 signal at full speed. Lots of engineers worked very hard to make it so you wouldn’t need to buy new (passive) cables to get the speed boost, but Apple sells mostly active cables, so they won’t tell you this. Also, unverified crap Chinese cables generally have much lower signal integrity, and very likely will NOT work at TB5 speeds. But if you’ve got a cable like that, there’s no harm in trying it out.

[@cwaynefox]

The cable to connect the dock was a ThunderBolt 5 Intel certified cable supplied in the box with the Kensington. The SSD’s attached were all USB4, and I used shorter cables, all 1 meter or less. These are not TB5 devices and TB4 cables should have been adequate. I tried 3 brands, Apple, CalDigit, and OWC, all Intel Certified, all with identical results. If you saw longer cables in the video it was because they were lying on the table from various other testing, but they weren’t used in the test.

[@ahgflyguy]

@ Sorry, my comment on cable compatibility wasn’t a criticism of anything in the video, it was intended as a PSA, but I didn’t make that clear. I just think it’s not widely-enough known that most people who are buying TB5 equipment, especially this early, probably don’t need to buy new cables. At a minimum, it’s worth connecting things together and checking speeds before buying new cables.

[@archie7012]

huh, I am looking to get a Thunderbolt 5 dock, since I am planning on upgrading my M1 Pro MacBook Pro to a M4 Pro Mac. But this is not the solution I look for. But thanks for pointing out the issue, I would have never thought they release a product like this with lesser bandwith than TB4 can do already. But if iVanky has a thermal "ptoblem" then this isn't good either. A pain. I am happy I found your channel.

[@dbcooper7326]

I am holding out for the Caldigit TS5

[@kilosierraalpha]

Wayne, saw this somewhere else: If a USB4 SSD is to be used with an Intel Mac, connecting it via a TB5 dock could almost double its performance, but a TB4 hub doesn’t help. Connecting a TB3 SSD to any Mac via a TB4 hub or TB5 dock is likely to reduce its write speed to about 1.5 GB/s or less. Connecting a USB4 SSD to an Apple silicon Mac via a TB4 hub will reduce its read and write speeds below 3 GB/s. Some combinations of host port, hub/dock and SSD can result in more severely impaired performance. Those are unpredictable, and can only be discovered by careful testing in combination.

[@thedave1771]

That power cable is a standard connector, look up Mickey Mouse Power Cable. It’s the +ground version of the two-pin you’re familiar with.

[@cwaynefox]

I’ve had one or two other devices use this connector in the dozens of computer products I’ve used over the years. I guess what I'm saying is it’s not the standard connector 99% of devices use for the AC cord connection.

[@ahgflyguy]

Re displays, an M4 Mac mini (non-pro) can drive 2x4k144 + 1x4k60. Which is pretty good. My TB3 dock attached to a TB4 port of the non-pro Mini can display dual 4k144, which is honestly more than I thought you could squeeze through a 40 Gbps pipe. Looks like MacOS is doing a decent job of using DSC. My USB4 windows machine can do the same, of course. So I would expect the TB5 dock can actually do a good deal more display-pushing than the Mac can. Wait for the M4 Mac Studios with the Ultra chip to see what the dock is actually capable of. But just to be sure, triple 4k144 is only 50% more than what TB3 can handle. And TB3 and 4 only allot about 70% of the outbound 40 Gbps for displays, so maybe 30 Gbps. TB5 can go into a 120 Gbps outbound mode, with 80 Gbps of that reserved for displays. So I think a maxed-out TB5 dock should be capable of 5x 4k144, with a little room left over for a sixth 4k running at 4k60. Approximately.

[@cwaynefox]

I agree, I think TB5’s bandwidth will open a lot of possibilities for docking without sacrificing speed to storage devices. I’m more focused on getting decent bandwidth to storage devices while also being able to run a couple of 4k/5k 120/144 hz displays. Looking forward to testing some good TB5 docks, also will be interested to test a TB5 external PCI cabinet, which might make a Mac Studio viable for those that rely on MacPros for their various audio cards, etc.

[@raven2004]

Thanks for the review. Being on the bleeding edge of every thunderbolt revision comes with flaky products that usually never work as they should and are ridiculously expensive for fomo buyers. The markup on these docks is nuts, just look at how much cheaper TB3 docks are now. My thought is to simply wait. Outside of the instant gratification of seeing BM speed tests the difference between TB 3/4 and TB 5 isn’t game changing in a real world work environment. You are paying money just to be the first.

[@healinginfluence]

Thank you for this. Good information.

[@tek_soup]

goodluck! depends on the company, i've had Asus "Support" bs me, for almost a year, gave up, eventually.

[@zsoltcselenyi622]

No nvme option, no 10Gbe, or 25Gbe, what a waste of hardware…

[@cwaynefox]

thanks of the comment. Seems to me NVMe option is pretty uncommon in large docks like this, since most users have other options they use for desktop storage, and 10GbE would add quite a bit to the price for a feature than a minuscule number of users would actually use.

[@zsoltcselenyi622]

I would argue with that, as besides additional connections it’s extremely overpriced. We already have at least 3 TB5 ports on the M4 Macs… Forgot to mention that bulky power supply, it’s like an ancient laptop power brick from 2010, it should be at least a Gan or Gan2 supply in 2024. Even Apple supply Gan chargers, like the 140W one.