In the first few years of work, I was very obsessed with desktop computers, and I felt that the desktop platform had strong performance and good scalability, and it was also cool to find a small space to arrange a set of desktop scenes. However, with the change of job position and content, I often need to travel or bring design drafts to communicate with customers, so I fully shifted the productivity platform to notebooks, which are sufficient in terms of performance, but the scalability is very limited.
In order to solve this problem, I recently bought the 13-in-1 version of the Greenlink multi-screen docking station, which can connect all peripherals when I connect the docking station at home, and unplug the docking station when I need to go out to take the notebook away.
The packaging continues the green and white style of Greenlink, with the pattern of the docking station and the model number printed on the front, and it is also specially marked that it supports 100W charging, 10Gbps transfer rate and 4K60Hz image quality. In addition to the docking station, the package also comes with instruction manuals in multiple Chinese languages.
The body of the docking station is made of aluminum alloy, CNC carved integrated molding, the surface is anodized sandblasting, the dark gray matte texture is very high-grade, the touch is delicate and warm, and the metal shell also has better thermal conductivity. The 13-in-1 version measures 166*70*20mm, so you can easily tuck it into your laptop bag if you need to take it on the go.
The expansion interfaces are distributed on both sides, covering basically all the expansion interfaces used in daily life. On one side is the SD/TF card slot, 3.5mm headphone jack, USB port (one 5Gbps rate, two 10Gbps rates) and one TypeC port (10Gbps rate), and on the other side is the TypeC charging port (100W), DP port, two HDMI ports, USB port (5Gbps rate) and RJ-45 network cable port.
A TypeC interface cable extends from the narrow side, with a length of about 20 cm, and the high-density braided cable is very flexible and not easy to be damaged after many bends in ordinary use.
Next, let's talk about how I use it to solve my notebook expansion needs. I usually use my laptop as my main machine when I go home, but whether it's for design or tossing self-media to cut videos, due to the relatively small screen size of the laptop, I often need to switch back and forth between multiple windows, which is more troublesome. I have a LG 34-inch curved screen on my desk at home,It is also matched with a joint innovation4K secondary screen,Through the green docking station, you can connect the notebook and these two screens,Form a multi-screen display,The middle 34-inch curved screen is used as the main display,The joint innovation on the left is used as the secondary screen,The original screen of the notebook is used as another secondary screen。
After composing such a form, PhotoShop or other design software will be displayed on the main screen when making the design, and the documents and reference pages sent by the customer will be placed on the secondary screen on the left one by one, so that it is convenient to design or modify according to the requirements. The laptop screen on the right can be placed in the QQ or WeChat chat window, which can be synchronized with the customer.
Or when you cut a video, put Premiere on the home screen, which is relatively wide, which is just the right advantage to take advantage of it, and you don't have to constantly adjust the timeline ratio. The color reproduction of the joint innovation secondary screen on the left is more accurate,And 4KThe resolution perception is also more delicate,You can put the preview window over,You can see a more accurate picture color effect。
Of course,This is just the way I'm used to it,This docking station of Greenlink has two HDMI interfaces and one DP interface,Up to three external monitors can be connected,The three interfaces are connected separately to support 4K@60Hz image quality output,Compatible with 2K@144Hz、2K@120Hz、1080P@240Hz and 1080P@144Hz。 Under the Windows system, it supports four-screen different displays, that is, notebooks + three monitors form a linkage, respectively, to display different content, two of which can reach 4K@60Hz, and the other screen can only reach 4K@30Hz. If it is a dual-screen different display or a four-screen simultaneous display, there is no such limitation, and it is also compatible with Mac systems.
In addition to expanding the display, storage devices such as USB flash drives also need to be connected with it. The dock has a total of five USB ports, three supporting 10Gbps rates, two supporting 5Gbps rates, and one TypeC data port supporting 10Gbps rates. Among them, the USB interface that supports 10Gbps rate adopts the latest USB3.2 protocol, which can theoretically transfer 1G files in 1 second.
However, in actual use, the transfer protocol of the USB flash drive and the protocol supported by the laptop will affect the transfer speed, so the significance of the docking station supporting the high rate is that it will not drag down the USB flash drive and the notebook. The U disk I use is the old model of the previous USB3.0 protocol, but through the test, it can be seen that the read and write speed of the U disk directly inserted into the computer and the computer connected to the computer through the docking station is not too much, which shows that the transmission performance of the docking station is very strong, and there is no problem of lagging.
The TF and SD card slots on the side of the docking station are also very practical, and the footage usually taken with a camera or drone can be transferred to the computer through the docking station, without having to buy another card reader. Both card slots support the SD3.0 standard and can reach a maximum speed of 104MB/s.
I used the SD card in my hand to test the read and write speed of the card reader and the docking station respectively, and the measured results showed that the transmission speed of the green docking station was faster.
The 3.5mm headphone jack on the docking station is also very practical, many thin and light books have canceled the 3.5mm interface, usually listening to songs, chasing dramas, playing games can use Bluetooth headsets, but the delay of Bluetooth headphones when cutting videos will cause the sound and picture to be out of sync, so you can only connect a wired headset through the docking station to do monitoring. It is worth mentioning that this 3.5mm connector can also be used to expand the microphone, and the input/output is two in one.
I don't use the RJ-45 network cable interface very often, mainly because my router and laptop are in the same room, and the wireless signal is relatively strong. And if there is no wireless network coverage, or the signal is not good, you can also use it to temporarily connect to the network cable to support gigabit network.
Connecting the laptop to the docking station will occupy a TypeC interface on the notebook, so a TypeC power supply interface is specially reserved on the side of the docking station, which supports up to 100W power and is used to charge the notebook. I tested it with the RedmiBook14 in my hand, and the real-time power can reach 20V-2.3A, which is the same as the power of the original charger directly connected to the notebook.
In addition to being paired with a laptop, it can also be connected to a mobile phone or tablet for OTG expansion. For example, if you insert a USB flash drive or SD card, you can view files on the external storage device directly on your phone. Some phones that support desktop mode can also connect a monitor to enter desktop mode.
The Greenlink docking station can meet the needs of high-speed transmission and 100-watt power supply at the same time, and it is bound to heat up after long-term use. Therefore, it adopts a triple heat dissipation structure, with heat dissipation aluminum sheets and condensation liquid glue on the internal chip to reduce the heat of the chip from the root, and cooperate with the aluminum alloy shell to export the heat in time to avoid the situation that the heat affects the performance. After a few hours of normal use, the measured surface temperature was only 36.1 degrees.
Combined with more than a week of use, this 13-in-1 multi-screen docking station of Greenlink can fully meet the expansion needs of the main machine notebook, covering all the interfaces used daily, making the expandability of the notebook more powerful than the desktop, and the protocols and rates supported by each interface are also the current high standards, which will not lag behind. In particular, it supports four-screen different displays, connects multiple monitors at home to work collaboratively, and the efficiency is significantly improved, and it can also supply power to the direction of the notebook. Just unplug the docking station when you go out and you can take the laptop with you. For those who usually use notebooks as their main productivity tools, it is recommended to start.