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expired Posted by turns2stone • Dec 25, 2024
expired Posted by turns2stone • Dec 25, 2024

Select Stores: Western Digital WD Black D50 RGB Game Dock (Thunderbolt 3)

& More In-Store Purchase Only

$50

$80

37% off
Micro Center
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Deal Details
Micro Center has select Western Digital WD Black Game Docks (Thunderbolt 3 Connectivity) for the prices listed. In-store purchase only.

Note: Availability for pickup may vary by location.

Thanks to Community Member turns2stone and SD Moderator Mbilo for finding this deal.

Available:Features (D50):
  • Multi-Port Gaming Connectivity
  • 2 x Thunderbolt 3
  • 1 x DisplayPort 1.4
  • 2 x 10 Gb/s USB Type-C
  • 3 x 10 Gb/s USB Type-A
  • 1 x 3.5mm Audio Input/Output
  • 1 x Gigabit Ethernet
  • Up to 87W of Passthrough Charging
  • Customizable RGB Lighting

Editor's Notes

Written by powerfuldoppler | Staff
  • About this deal:
    • This price is $30 lower (37% savings) than the list price of $79.99
  • About this product:
    • 5-Years Limited Warranty

Original Post

Written by turns2stone
Community Notes
About the Poster
Deal Details
Community Notes
About the Poster
Micro Center has select Western Digital WD Black Game Docks (Thunderbolt 3 Connectivity) for the prices listed. In-store purchase only.

Note: Availability for pickup may vary by location.

Thanks to Community Member turns2stone and SD Moderator Mbilo for finding this deal.

Available:Features (D50):
  • Multi-Port Gaming Connectivity
  • 2 x Thunderbolt 3
  • 1 x DisplayPort 1.4
  • 2 x 10 Gb/s USB Type-C
  • 3 x 10 Gb/s USB Type-A
  • 1 x 3.5mm Audio Input/Output
  • 1 x Gigabit Ethernet
  • Up to 87W of Passthrough Charging
  • Customizable RGB Lighting

Editor's Notes

Written by powerfuldoppler | Staff
  • About this deal:
    • This price is $30 lower (37% savings) than the list price of $79.99
  • About this product:
    • 5-Years Limited Warranty

Original Post

Written by turns2stone

Community Voting

Deal Score
+51
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Top Comments

Every port on a Thunderbolt 4 device that isn't Thunderbolt (i.e. a path to support internal SSD) must share a single 10GBps slice of USB bandwidth.

https://www.owc.com/blog/whats-th...nderbolt-4
This is not common knowledge. But leave it to Intel to invent something and cripple it. Not the first time they have done it thinking it will win them market share.

We also have to thank Intel for HDCP whose sole purpose was to prevent some niche pirating that was not a huge problem. A shitty evil
Corp all around.
Whoa there cowboy! All of those (save for the Kensington) are standard USB hubs, not Thunderbolt!

Thunderbolt 3 docks inherently have 40Gbps of combined throughput for the ports, whereas those USB-C dock have 10Gbps of bandwidth shared among all of the peripherals, including display. If you're really pushing the limits with simultaneous heavy use of a 4K display, 1Gbps LAN and and attached USB device, you're going to run out of bandwidth.

Even more importantly, those hubs either don't come with a charger, and/or don't support pass-through charging. A Thunderbolt dock does both. And the Kensington supports 60w vs. 87w on this Western Digital.

In summary, you're not comparing apples-to-apples for those (cheaper) USB-C docks. If you're using this D50 dock with a MacBook (or even Mac mini), you'll get two independent video outputs.

I realize you're probably on Windows, but if you bought any of those for use with a Mac, that 'dual HDMI' would literally get you two identical monitor outputs, mirrored to each other.
EDIT - clarifying extended monitor support/mirroring.
EDIT #2 - the other nice thing about the D50 (compared to the cheaper docks linked) is the ability to add/change to a longer cable to your laptop/PC. Most of the hubs have permanently-attached cables, and they're typically short to reduce the chance of signal degradation.

125 Comments

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Dec 25, 2024
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Dec 25, 2024
Mbilo
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I agree that these look like nice features for the price, especially considering the rare SSD slot. Here's the 1TB version for $99 in case the other is out of stock.

https://www.microcenter.com/produ...10bbk-nesn
1
Dec 25, 2024
279 Posts
Joined Sep 2009
Dec 25, 2024
misterputz
Dec 25, 2024
279 Posts
Quote from turns2stone :
Also, to get out ahead of "why isn't this Thunderbolt 4?" Well, TB4 can't support a dock with 4 lanes of PCIe which is what you'd need for fast NVMe storage. In other words, if this used TB4, your SSD would cap out at ~700MB/s. But you can expect ~2,500MB/s for quality SSDs in this dock, because it uses TB3.
That seems highly suspect and false information. Where do you get that TB4 can't supports a dock with 4 lanes of PCIE?
5
Dec 25, 2024
1,416 Posts
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Dec 25, 2024
pelo
Dec 25, 2024
1,416 Posts
Do you need an Apple product or a high-end laptop to drive this, no? You can not use a regular USB3 or USB-C from your middle-of-the-road desktop motherboard, or am I missing something.
1
Dec 25, 2024
161 Posts
Joined Mar 2018
Dec 25, 2024
SomethingAzn2
Dec 25, 2024
161 Posts
Quote from pelo :
Do you need an Apple product or a high-end laptop to drive this, no? You can not use a regular USB3 or USB-C from your middle-of-the-road desktop motherboard, or am I missing something.
Need thunderbolt 3, so most desktop motherboards won't have it, but relatively newer laptops probably will (or most of the mac lineup)
1
1
Dec 25, 2024
161 Posts
Joined Mar 2018
Dec 25, 2024
SomethingAzn2
Dec 25, 2024
161 Posts
Quote from Mbilo :
I agree that these look like nice features for the price, especially considering the rare SSD slot. Here's the 1TB version for $99 in case the other is out of stock.

https://www.microcenter.com/produ...10bbk-nesn [microcenter.com]
Other way to look at it is 1TB ssd for $50 more which is not a bad price / TB
1
Dec 25, 2024
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Joined Mar 2018

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Original Poster
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Dec 25, 2024
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turns2stone
Dec 25, 2024
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Our community has rated this post as helpful. If you agree, why not thank turns2stone

Quote from misterputz :
That seems highly suspect and false information. Where do you get that TB4 can't supports a dock with 4 lanes of PCIE?
Every port on a Thunderbolt 4 device that isn't Thunderbolt (i.e. a path to support internal SSD) must share a single 10GBps slice of USB bandwidth.

https://www.owc.com/blog/whats-th...nderbolt-4
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Dec 25, 2024
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Gameross
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Can you hook this up to a USB-C port and use it too?
1
Original Poster
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turns2stone
Dec 25, 2024
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Quote from Gameross :
Can you hook this up to a USB-C port and use it too?
no. Must be Thunderbolt.
1
Dec 25, 2024
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Dec 25, 2024
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Dec 25, 2024
SlickStraw6606
Dec 25, 2024
4 Posts
Hello I am extremely dumb when it comes to computers is this like an external hard drive?
2
Dec 25, 2024
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edgarwong
Dec 25, 2024
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Quote from SlickStraw6606 :
Hello I am extremely dumb when it comes to computers is this like an external hard drive?
This is like a splitter that gives you more ports and also has a slot for drive built in. You have to supply your own drive
2
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sr27
Dec 25, 2024
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Our community has rated this post as helpful. If you agree, why not thank sr27

Quote from -Uncharted- :
Because it's common knowledge in the IT world
This is not common knowledge. But leave it to Intel to invent something and cripple it. Not the first time they have done it thinking it will win them market share.

We also have to thank Intel for HDCP whose sole purpose was to prevent some niche pirating that was not a huge problem. A shitty evil
Corp all around.
Last edited by sr27 December 25, 2024 at 06:11 AM.
1
6
Dec 25, 2024
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mazda3ndp
Dec 25, 2024
30 Posts
This might be the most well written deal description ever. Thank you sir/maam!
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Dec 25, 2024
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Christophorus
Dec 25, 2024
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I got it a few days ago. ssd runs hot. otherwise pretty good.
1

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