Anker Apex Thunderbolt 4 Dock
Power and ports galore for your Intel MacBook
$299.99 From us.anker.com Features 90W MacBook charging, 20W Power Delivery, triple 4K display support
Anker’s latest dock for Intel MacBooks, comes with a 120W external power supply and Thunderbolt 4 cable which carries both data and up to 90W of power directly to your Thunderbolt–equipped laptop. It also supplies 20W to its USB–C port with Power Delivery, so you can charge your Mac and iOS device at full power at the same time.
It has a total of 12 ports split between its front and rear sides. In addition to the main Thunderbolt 4 and USB–C port on the front are an audio jack, a power button and an SD card 4.0 UHS–II slot for fast data transfers. The rear has four USB–A ports; two USB 2.0 and two USB 3.0, all powered suitably for charging smaller devices, and a gigabit ethernet port.
Then you get to some pretty nifty display options. There’s a second Thunderbolt 4 port, this one provides 15W of power and
40Gbps data. But it can also drive a 5K monitor at 60Hz when one external display is connected. And then two HDMI ports, both of which can drive a 4K display at 60Hz. So you can drive up to three monitors in addition to your MacBook’s display, all at 4K (60Hz). Windows can do a little better here, with single monitor support up to 8K, but is slightly slower. MacOS is also only able to mirror content across its two HDMI ports where Windows can use them independently, but again this is down to the operating system, not the dock.
This is a smart–looking, compact dock that provides more than enough expandability for the majority of MacBook owners, though it’s a big investment.
THE BOTTOM LINE. A great power and expansion solution for Intel MacBooks. HOLLIN JONES