Action Star Technology, a Taiwanese OEM/ODM of USB productivity solutions part of Qisda (BenQ group), has unveiled its USB4 penta-4K120 docking station at Computex 2023 with support for up to five 4K displays at a refresh rate of up to 120 Hz.
The docking station is based on Synaptics chips, and besides support for up to five 4K displays, it can also handle up to three 8K displays at 60+ Hz, and offers Ethernet, audio, and 10 Gbps USB 3.2 interfaces.
USB4 Penta-4K120 docking station specifications:
- USB4 docking station backward compatible with USB-C/USB 3.x
- Based on Synaptics VMM9430 DisplayPort 2.1 (DP 2.1) multi-stream transport (MST) hub and DisplayLink DL-7400 universal display docking solution. See the separate (January 2023) press release about the chips
- Display
- Support up to 5x 4K/120Hz video outputs
- 1x native DisplayPort up to 8K/85Hz using DSC (8K/75Hz for HDR)
- 4x DisplayLink outputs up to quad 4K/120Hz or dual 8K/60Hz with HDR10 support
- Audio – 3.5mm audio jack
- Networking – 2.5Gbps (TBC) Ethernet RJ45 interface
- USB
- 1x USB4 input port
- 2x USB 3.2 (10 Gbps) Type-A ports, 1x USB Type-C port (10 Gbps)
- Power Supply – 20V DC jack
Action Star says the USB4 docking station works with Windows, macOS, ChromeOS, and Linux operating systems.
The company does not provide availability and pricing information, but considering Synaptics VMM9430 and DisplayLink DL-7400 chips will only go into production in Q4 2023, the USB4 Penta-4K120 dock should only become at that time or in Q1 2024, possibly under the BenQ brand. In the meantime, Action Star will be showcasing it at Computex 2023 next week along with other USB products that include the USB4 Triple-4K60 docking station and a USB wireless docking station with WiFi 6 and dual 4Kp60.
Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.
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It’s Qisda, not Qisba.
> the USB4 docking station works with Windows, macOS, ChromeOS, and Linux operating systems
Why should the OS matter at all? Since DisplayLink. For anyone not familiar with this ‘technology’: it doesn’t work out of the box but you need a driver (good luck if your OS is ‘too new’ or ‘too old’) and officially only Ubuntu is supported: https://www.synaptics.com/products/displaylink-graphics/downloads/ubuntu
Hoping and waiting for USB4 docking stations that have a 10GbE (10 Gigabit Ethernet) multi-gig koppar port built-in since there are not yet any 10GbE USB4 adapters available and 10GbE Thunderbolt adapters are still very expensive.
finally, more and more devices of this type are being presented 😉