Has anyone found a USB-C docking station compat w/ HP Spectre 360 15, ext 4K mon, 90W pass-thru?

[DSchulman]

I'm looking for a USB-C docking station, that has enough pass-through power (90W) to charge the Spectre 15 via the USB-C port, and support for an external 4K monitor.  The elite docking station doesn't support the Spectre. If anyone finds one, please report it here. THANK YOU.

If you're looking for a good portable charger, the 90W Battpower unit on Amazon works great, and is very portable. Only doing this here because HP doesn't have one. You get a Windows notification on on bootup/wake-up recommending HP adapters, but otherwise works great, stays cool.

[spectored]

There is a deafening silence from HP on this issue.  I have the same series and as you noticed from the lack of responses, HP pretends no one is asking the question, even though that question has arisen repeatedly.  Some also report that they are having trouble driving multiple monitors through a spectre-coupled dock, whether it charges back or not.

HP where are you?

[DSchulman]

Has anyone tried the VisionTek Universal DUAL 4K USB DOCK?

[0xa1]

The Caldigit PS3 Plus does not work with the Spectre x360 15. The Rep said that they were working on a solution, but that was over 3 weeks ago and still no reply. Huh, I didn't know they were an HP subsidiary ...

[OJAY_UK]

Did anyone have any joy with this?

HP still keep recommending I use the either the USB-C port replicator or the Elite Thunderbolt 3 dock for my Envy x360.

The USB-C is only 60W so will not do the power passthrough, plus the monitor ports are Display ports and not HDMI.

And the Thunderbolt dock just doesn't work.....

Keen to get something that does work......

[DSchulman]

I still haven't found a solution. My primary objective is to find a single-USB-C cable connection to a docking station that will connect an external monitor and USB devices AND charge the Spectre 15. I've dropped my requirement for 4K external monitor support. 

On that topic, I wrestled with HP for many months over the compatibility issues facing text scaling on an external 1920 x 1080 monitor, as no matter what the settings were, if you dragged a window from the laptop to the ext mon some of the text would be HUGE, or if you dragged a window from the ext to the laptop, the text would be too small to read. The techs at HP had no idea how to fix it. Called it a Windows issue. I found the fix - set the laptop to 1920 x 1080! My eyes cannot tell the difference in the resolution of the laptop screen, and now, when I move windows back and forth, there's no scaling issues! Why the HP techs never thought to suggest that, given all of the hours I spent with them on the phone, is beyond me. Perhaps they thought it was a non-starter.

[DSchulman]

I still haven't found a solution. My primary objective is to find a single-USB-C cable connection to a docking station that will connect an external monitor and USB devices AND charge the Spectre 15. I've dropped my requirement for 4K external monitor support. 

On that topic, I wrestled with HP for many months over the compatibility issues facing text scaling on an external 1920 x 1080 monitor, as no matter what the settings were, if you dragged a window from the laptop to the ext mon some of the text would be HUGE, or if you dragged a window from the ext to the laptop, the text would be too small to read. The techs at HP had no idea how to fix it. Called it a Windows issue. I found the fix - set the laptop to 1920 x 1080! My eyes cannot tell the difference in the resolution of the laptop screen, and now, when I move windows back and forth, there's no scaling issues! Why the HP techs never thought to suggest that, given all of the hours I spent with them on the phone, is beyond me. Perhaps they thought it was a non-starter.

[OJAY_UK]

Cheers DSchulman, appreciate the reply.

Frustrating to say the least. Especially when the HP person that recommended the two docking stations I purchased just replied back to my response with:

"As you mentioned you tried the docking stations recommended but the issue still persists.

For most of the HP consumer laptops, we have very few docking stations as consumer laptops are used for home only and do not require a docking station connected always.

So you have to go with the regular USB-C universal docking station."

Thanks for the input on the screen incompatibility - will keep that in mind.

So, back to the drawing board. For me now, it will be easier to just go an buy another vendor laptop that work with a docking station. Shame on HP.

[spectored]

Yes,

on most counts; The "Pluggable USB-C triple display 4K Docking station" will-

drive  a  4K Dell monitor (I have only one, so no info on multiples)

• Charge my 90W late 2017 iteration of the spectre 15 with 8th gen i7
• Actually allow me to use the external monitor to wake a "closed-lid" spectre using the keyboard hooked to the docking station (in most cases)
• keep correct scaling as long as I don't unplug the laptop to use off the desk.  When replugged, it usually is whacked for scaling.

• Important; HP is changing the internals and Bios on these machines almost quarterly, it seems.  So no guarantees.  They may have upped the new machines to 120W, which probably means my docking station won't work to charge the higher wattage machines.
• HP doesn't give a **bleep** about consumer issues.  One must assume they're morons, contract help, (both?), and aware that business pays for solutions (service contracts), and consumers rate only BS.

It would seem appropriate to me that an HP exec should receive a lash for every time I receive the HP pop-up about genuine HP charging products every time I wake my machine.  After all, when I bought my computer, you couldn't even buy a replacement charging brick, let alone an HP docking device.  Those people are evil.

[David_J_W]

I suspect the underlying issue here is one of market segmentation. HP provide docking solutions for many laptops intended primarily for the business market - primarily the ZBook, EliteBook and ProBook ranges (see this PDF for details).

Testing and qualifying a laptop for docking has a cost attached - not just a one-off cost prior to release, but the costs of testing and fixing any docking related issues that arise in driver or BIOS updates throughout the product lifecycle as well as providing customer support on docking issues. This expense is perhaps difficult to justify in the more consumer orientated ranges, especially as consumers are notoriously price-sensitive (so will not appreciate this additional expense being passed on in the purchase price), many will not want a docking solution and those that do might gravitate towards cheaper third party docking solutions rather than buying the HP qualified solution.

That said, the market is changing as USB-C and Thunderbolt 3 become more ubiquitous. Until around 3 years ago, there was no real standard for docking connectors and solutions were typically proprietary as well as changing over time. These days most mid and some low end laptops have USB-C ports with DisplayPort alternate mode capability, which typically means one port can charge the laptop, provide USB connectivity and drive an external 4K display at 60Hz - an ideal basis for docking in many consumer scenarios. Hopefully compatibility between consumer laptops and third party docking stations will improve as USB-C matures.

Probably the biggest issue with some of the laptops mentioned in this thread is the 90W power requirement. Many docking solutions have a 65W Power Delivery limit - some don't even manage that. 100W capable docking solutions are rather less common.

HP can only guarantee docking compatibility if you buy a laptop that has at least one HP docking station on the accessory list and you buy a HP docking station from that model's accessory list.