By Julian Prokaza on Monday, 14 January 2008
 If you use a laptop for long periods in one place (your desk,
for instance), it's a good idea to plug in an external mouse and keyboard -
and a monitor, if you have one - so that you're not sitting with a hunched posture
all day. Connecting and disconnecting this lot each day is a bit of a bind though,
which is where a docking station comes in.
Most laptop manufacturers offer optional docking stations but they only tend
to work with one particular range of laptops. If you don't mind making a few
small sacrifices (of which more later), a third-party dock is a cheaper solution.
We had high hopes for the Belkin High-Speed Docking Station we reviewed last
year, but it had a few too many limitations for our liking and the ExpressCard
connection meant that it wouldn't work with all laptops. The Toshiba DynaDock,
on the other hand, connects via USB - which means it'll work with anything.
The DynaDock has the same upright design as the Belkin model, but while it's
not quite so good-looking, a bit more thought has gone into its design. For
a start, rather than tuck every port away at the rear where they're difficult
to get to, the DynaDock puts a pair of USB ports on the front, along with microphone
and headphone sockets for the built-in audio.
All the other ports - the ones that'll be permanently connected to peripherals,
in other words - are at the rear. Unlike the dual-port Belkin, you'll need to
choose either the VGA or DVI port-equipped DynaDock, but both models have the
same set of Ethernet, USB 2.0 and serial ports.
There's also an optical S/PDIF port for an audio connection, but we can't imagine
that there are many laptop users with a desktop set-up that has something suitable
to plug this into and we'd prefer standard set of 3.5mm audio ports (the Belkin
has both options, incidentally).
The DynaDock connects to a laptop via a dedicated USB 2.0 port at the rear.
It only supports resolutions up to 1280 x 1024 (the Belkin goes up to 1600 x
1200), but the DynaDock handles an external display much more adroitly. An external
monitor simply appears as a second monitor to Windows and it can be set as the
primary display with the laptop screen set as the secondary one - something
the Belkin couldn't do. Neater still, the DynaDock utility automatically reconfigures
the laptop display as the primary one when the dock is disconnected, and sets
it back to secondary when it's plugged in. The DynaDock also supports ClearType
- unlike the Belkin.
Despite the greater bandwidth offered by the Belkin's ExpressCard connection,
its network performance was poor and heavy traffic slowed down the external
display. The DynaDock, on the other hand, didn't differ much from a standard
Ethernet port and while there was some display slowdown at times of heavy network
traffic, it was only really noticeable when dragging around windows on the Desktop.
Given that it costs around the same as many dedicated docking stations, the
DynaDock may not seem like particularly good value given that it's a compromise
solution, but it's worth remembering that it will work with any laptop. You
only need to switch to a different laptop once for it to have paid for itself
- and not all laptops have a dedicated dock option in the first place, of course.
One final point. There are some negative reviews of the DynaDock on the Toshiba
US website, where users complain of problems with the external display.
This was something we couldn't reproduce and the dock behaved normally with
Windows XP and Vista in our tests. Unfortunately, it's also worth noting that
the DyanDock costs $135 in the US, which makes the UK price seem a bit steep
in comparison.
Toshiba DynaDock
| Price
|
£99 (VGA), £122.87 (DVI) |
| Rating
|
5 out of 6 |
| Good
|
Works with any laptop; good performance |
| Bad
|
No 3.5mm audio ports; VGA or DVI -- not both
|
| Verdict
|
No cheaper than proprietary dock, but the Dynadock is more
versatile and it performs better than the similar Belkin model |
| Manufacturer
|
Toshiba
|
| Buy
from |
Toshiba
(VGA), Shiroi
(DVI) |
Specifications
| Resolution
|
Up to 1280 x 1024 |
| Ports
|
6x USB 2.0, Ethernet, VGA or DVI, mic, headphone, S/PDIF
out, serial |
| Size
|
45 x 78 x 222mm |
| Weight
|
500g |
|
