14 DAY TRIAL // We are aware of Kensington primarily due to its anti-theft devices, but the company has just released a pair of products whose purpose is significantly different, intended to provide convenience rather than safety.
We are speaking of the Office Dock and the Home Dock, which use DisplayLink technology to add a second screen to a laptop (video over USB 3.0).
The Home Dock gets USB 3.0 and USB 2.0 expansion ports, Gigabit LAN, DVI and VGA video outputs, and the DisplayLink DL-3700 integrated chip (IC).
The other, Office Dock, has a DisplayLink DL-3900 IC, USB 3.0/2.0 expansion ports and dual-head support for HDMI and DVI/VGA displays, plus 5.1 channel audio and, like the home Dock, Gigabit Ethernet.
“Migrating to the latest SuperSpeed Graphics Technology is the obvious choice for us to keep the technology edge that business users and consumers demand,” said Matt Evans, global product manager at Kensington.
“With DisplayLink’s USB3 technology and compatibility certification program, our customers can be confident that they have chosen the most feature rich, reliable, and easy to use dock to expand their notebooks.”
Kensington envisions buyers going from home to work, and vice versa, with only their laptops. When they reach their destination, they only need to connect the necessary cables according to the small manual that all hardware products ship with. No restarting is needed.
Sales should have already started, so those interested should check with their local retailers in case the items are in stock. The prices shouldn't be all that high: $169.99 for the Home Dock and $199.99 for the Office Dock.
That's 132.84 Euro and 156.26 Euro, respectively, but exchange rates seldom reflect actual price rates in Europe, so we expect something closer to 170 and 200 Euro instead.
“Kensington has long been a partner of DisplayLink and their new USB3.0 docks for home and office really meet the needs of users today,” said John Cummins, VP of sales and marketing for DisplayLink.
“We’re confident these will be winning products for Kensington and are happy to be jointly announcing this latest product family to their portfolio.”
