Overview: CalDigit TS5 Plus Thunderbolt 5 dock – a supercharged model of the very best dock for Mac [Video]

It’s laborious to imagine, however it’s been over seven years since I first bought my fingers on CalDigit’s TS3 Plus dock, and through its heyday, I labeled it as the very best dock for Mac customers. Since then, CalDigit launched the TS3’s successor, appropriately referred to as the CalDigit TS4 Thunderbolt 4 Dock, which supplied a refined tackle its predecessor.

Now, with the appearance of Thunderbolt 5 adoption for the newest M4 Professional Macs and better, CalDigit is again with an much more highly effective model of its TS-series dock – the CalDigit Thunderbolt Station 5 Plus, or TS5 Plus for brief. Sure, CalDigit has retuned to its “plus” nomenclature of the previous, because it plans to supply a much less highly effective 15-port model of the TS5 sooner or later.

The TS5 Plus, after all, contains help for Thunderbolt 5, however is there every other motive why potential consumers ought to contemplate it over the already nice TS4? Maybe! Watch my hands-on video evaluate for a more in-depth look, and remember to subscribe to 9to5Mac on YouTube for extra Mac peripheral protection.

Specs

The CalDigit TS5 Plus contains 20 ports, which bests its predecessor by two ports. Whereas the shape issue is usually the identical, the dock has elevated in dimension over the TS4, which itself was a bit bigger than the TS3 Plus. Right here’s a have a look at the entire interface particulars and extra specs:

Ports

• 1 x Thunderbolt 5 Upstream / USB4 v2 (140W | 80Gb/s)
• 2 x Thunderbolt 5 Downstream / USB4 v2 (36W | 80Gb/s)
• 4 x USB-C (Information Solely) (7.5W | 10Gb/s)
• 1 x USB-C (Information Solely) (36W | 10Gb/s)
• 5 x USB-A (Information Solely) (7.5W | 10Gb/s)
• 1 x SD Card Reader (SD 4.0 | UHS-II)
• 1 x microSD Card Reader (SD 4.0 | UHS-Il)
• 1 x DisplayPort 2.1
• 1 x 10 Gigabit Ethernet
• 1 x Entrance Combo Audio Jack (3.5mm)
• 1 x Rear Audio Jack In 1 (3.5mm)
• 1 x Rear Audio Jack Out 1 (3.5mm)
• 1 x DC In (24V | 13.75A)

Video: CalDigit TS5 Plus evaluate – a supercharged Thunderbolt 5 dock

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Further specs

• Top : 6.10″ (155.0mm) x Width : 1.85″ (47.0mm) x Size : 5.03″ (127.9mm)
• Weight: 1.98lbs (0.90kg)
• 140W energy ship to host
• Kensington Safety Slot
• Helps twin 4K/6K displays
• 1 x braided 1M Thunderbolt 5 cable
• 2 x rubber ft strips
• 1 x energy twine
• 1 x energy suppoly (330W)
• 2 yr guarantee
• Value: $499.99

Design and type issue

The TS5, whereas retaining the identical total type issue as its forebears, is considerably bigger than the TS3 Plus, and nonetheless fairly a bit bigger than the TS4. That is CalDigit’s heaviest and largest TS-series dock but, however there’s a motive for the elevated dimension and weight, specifically the addition of extra ports, and the additional quantity of energy that it may possibly each settle for from the hefty new energy provide, and thereafter ship to a number pc connection.

The TS5 Plus is 0.55-inches taller, 0.20-inches wider, and 0.57-inches longer than its direct predecessor. It additionally weighs 0.57lbs greater than the TS4.

After all, it wouldn’t be a CalDigit Dock with out the corporate’s staple ridged-aluminum sidewalls, which has turn out to be its trademark design characteristic. This design is just not solely nice for warmth dissipation, however it additionally permits the included rubber feat to simply connect to the chassis in an effort to orient the dock horizontally on a desktop as a substitute of vertically.

Value noting – the ft that CalDigit contains with the TS5 Plus ditch the longstanding translucent design for an identical area black look. Talking of which, the TS5 Plus is noticeabley darker than the already darkish area grey TS4. It’s a lot nearer to the area black anodized aluminum that’s discovered on the newest MacBook Professional – a decidedly good contact.

The entrance of the TS5 Plus options the identical actual port configuration because the TS4, albeit with a barely completely different orientation. Nonetheless, the specification of these ports have modified a bit. I’ll focus on that within the subsequent part.

The rear of the dock is the place you’ll discover the additional two ports featured on the TS5 Plus, which encompass two further 10Gb/s USB-C knowledge ports that be a part of the one USB-C knowledge port discovered on the TS4. These knowledge ports are good for attaching any further USB-C equipment, however are notably good for connecting bus-powered USB-C SSDs, since they supply sufficient energy (7.5W) to drive these gadgets.

Noteworthy enhancements

Like its predecessor, the TS5’s enhancements transcend simply further ports. Fairly a number of enhancements have been made to the already present ports. Clearly, the most important enchancment has to do with the adoption of Thunderbolt 5, which supplies double the pace of Thunderbolt 4. On this regard, the TS5 is a a lot larger enchancment over the TS4 than the TS4 was over the TS3 Plus – as Thunderbolt 4 connectivity remained on the identical 40Gb/s as Thunderbolt 3.

Thunderbolt 4 elevated minimal PCIe knowledge necessities to 32Gb/s from 16Gb/s making it doable for exterior SSDs to stand up to three,000 MB/s. Thunderbolt 5 builds on this by doubling the PCIe knowledge bandwidth from 32Gb/s to 64Gb/s, which means that exterior drives can help speeds as much as 6,000 MB/s.

If in case you have a Mac with Thunderbolt 5, such because the M4 Professional Mac mini, or M4 Professional MacBook Professional, you’ll discover considerably improved speeds when connecting Thunderbolt 5 peripherals. For instance, when connecting the OWC Envoy Extremely Thunderbolt 5 SSD, you’ll get the identical 80Gb/s hyperlink pace as you’ll when connecting the drive straight your Mac’s Thunderbolt 5 port. Should you tried to attach the identical drive to an older dock just like the TS4, the hyperlink pace would fall again to 40Gb/s.

However that in and of itself showcases one of many strengths of Thunderbolt 5, and that’s backwards compatibility. So even if you happen to don’t but personal one of many newest Macs with Thunderbolt 5, you possibly can nonetheless take pleasure in its advantages with Thunderbolt 4, Thunderbolt 3 (Macs solely), and even straight USB-C gadgets just like the iPad Air or iPad mini, and have the peace of thoughts of understanding that you just’re ready for a future improve when the time comes.

140W Thunderbolt 5 upstream port

The earlier technology CalDigit TS4 was able to offering as much as 98W of energy to a number pc through its upstream port and included Thunderbolt cable. Whereas 98W is nothing to scoff at, that falls far beneath the 140W most energy enter of Apple’s 16-inch MacBook Professional. You wanted to make use of Apple’s fast-charge succesful 140W USB-C energy adapter for quick charging previously. The TS5, however, can cost the 16-inch MacBook Professional at full 140W pace when linked through the included braided 240W-capable Thunderbolt cable. Even higher is the truth that it may possibly recharge your linked MacBook Professional at full pace, even whereas different gadgets are being fed energy from its different ports.

140W + 36W(3) + 7.5W(9) = 315.5 W

That’s as a result of CalDigit features a huge 330W energy provide, which supplies simply sufficient energy to feed all 12 powered ports with out throttling again the upstream energy connection – spectacular. Granted, the draw back of that is that the ability brick has gotten a lot larger, however this can be a tradeoff that I believe should be customers might be positive with given the advantages.

The unit additionally helps offline charging for the entire energy ports apart from two of the USB-A ports on the rear which might be purposely disabled when there’s no host connection. That is splendid for connecting gadgets that you just desire to remain powered down when your Mac is just not connected to the dock.

36W Thunderbolt 5 downstream ports

The TS5’s two downstream Thunderbolt 5 ports now provide greater than double the ability, going from 15W on the TS4 to 36W on the TS5 Plus. This is sufficient to quick cost the iPhone 16 Professional, and might be greater than sufficient energy for future power-hungry bus-powered Thunderbolt 5 SSDs.

I additionally tried connecting my Rodecaster Duo audio interface to certainly one of these downstream ports, reasoning that because it solely required 27W of energy, it needs to be sufficient to energy the interface. Oddly sufficient it wouldn’t energy the interface by way of the downstream 36W Thunderbolt 5 ports, however powered it positive from the front-facing 36W USB-C knowledge port. I reached out to CalDigit to see why this is likely to be, however I’m guessing it’s one thing to do with the best way that Rode has carried out its energy supply spec.

36W USB-C knowledge port

CalDigit upgraded its powered front-facing USB-C port on the TS5 Plus, going from 20W on the TS4 to a robust 36W. Once more, this might be nice for quick charging the newest iPhone 16 Professional, recharging an iPad, and many others.

Twin USB Controllers

When linked to a Thunderbolt host machine, the TS5 Plus supplies further bandwidth to linked USB gadgets through two devoted 10Gb/s controllers. How is that this helpful? Earlier than, if you’d add two excessive bandwidth SSDs to 2 separate USB connections, these drives would share the identical logical bandwidth, and subsequently have to separate the quantity of 10Gb/s bandwidth. In such a state of affairs with the TS5, it’s now doable for each of these drives to derive the utmost 10Gb/s bandwidth independently.

CalDigit has configured the entire USB-A ports and front-facing USB-C ports to a single controller, and the entire rear-facing USB-C ports, together with the 2 Thunderbolt ports, and the front-facing SD Card and microSD card slots, to the second controller. This makes for probably quicker speeds when transferring recordsdata from a number of SD Playing cards to an exterior USB-C SSD if in case you have them linked to separate controllers.

10 Gigabit Ethernet port

Some of the noteworthy upgrades is the transfer from 2.5GbE on the TS4 to a full 10GbE connection on the TS5 Plus. This was one of many areas that I hoped would get addressed, and I used to be not disillusioned. The addition of 10GbE means having tremendous quick connections to 10GbE NAS packing containers just like the UGREEN NASync, or within the case the place you’re lucky sufficient to have 5- or 10Gb fiber Web connectivity, it’ll be nice for that as properly.

DisplayPort 2.1

The final main port enchancment over the TS4 is the transfer from DisplayPort 1.4 to Show Port 2.1. This is sensible contemplating that DisplayPort 2.1 incorporates an enormous enchancment over 1.4, offering as much as 80Gb/s of show bandwidth. This enables for connecting to greater decision show with greater body charges.

Show connectivity

I at present run a single show setup, that being the Asus ProArt 5K show, which I reviewed earlier this yr. This show options a number of methods to attach it to a Mac, together with USB-C, DisplayPort, and HDMI. For connecting to HDMI displays, customers should buy a USB-C to HDMI dongle like this USB-C to HDMI 2.0b Adapter.

I examined the ProArt 5K with the CalDigit TS5 Plus through a USB-C connection, and it labored positive. One factor to notice, nevertheless, is that USB-C show connections want to make use of one of many dock’s two Thunderbolt ports, though technically, the show doesn’t require Thunderbolt. Alternatively, I can connect with the dock’s DisplayPort connection utilizing a DisplayPort cable. This serves to unencumber that Thunderbolt port, which is clearly extra fascinating seeing as that there are solely two downstream Thunderbolt ports accessible.

For Mac customers with a number of shows, the TS5 Plus helps as much as two exterior shows directly, at as much as 6K decision. Which means you possibly can simply join two Professional Show XDRs if you happen to occur to have it like that. 💰

CalDigit’s Dock additionally works properly with excessive refresh price shows because of Thunderbolt 5’s Bandwidth Enhance know-how. Bandwidth Enhance allocates one of many downstream 40Gb/s lanes for a complete of 120Gb/s for show connectivity. The remainder of the dock subsequently retains 40Gb/s for knowledge switch. This enables customers to attach a single 4K show as much as 240Hz, or with sure Macs, even twin 4K shows at 240Hz. The earlier TS4 was solely capable of do excessive refresh for a single 4K show as much as 144Hz. CalDigit says that Mac customers can join a single 8K show as much as 60Hz on Professional/Max Apple Silicon. On the TS4, 8K help was restricted to PCs.

As a result of exterior show configurations will be complicated, CalDigit supplies a full chart outlining show such connectivity. Additionally included are specs for Thunderbolt 4 and Thunderbolt 5 Home windows PCs. Home windows customers can take pleasure in connecting triple 4K shows as much as 144Hz, one thing Mac customers can’t, however notice that the TS5 Plus doesn’t work with Thunderbolt 3 PCs.

Downsides

Like with any product, the TS5 Plus isn’t excellent, and there are a number of downsides. The obvious draw back is the asking value: at $500, it’s far-off from impulse purchase territory. Should you’re buying this dock, then it is best to undoubtedly just be sure you have a necessity for it now, or that you just’ll be capable of reap the benefits of it absolutely sooner or later.

The unit can be bigger than its predecessors, so it’ll take up a bigger desktop footprint than earlier than. With that being mentioned, the truth that you possibly can orient the dock in each horizontal and vertical mode offers the TS5 Plus extra flexibility on this space than competing merchandise.

Should you’re connecting to a USB-C monitor, you’ll must make the most of one of many two downstream Thunderbolt ports so as to take action. Since downstream Thunderbolt ports are at a premium, I recommend utilizing DisplayPort connectivity if you happen to can. Some folks will scoff at the truth that the down lacks an HDMI port, however there are reliable technical causes for its omission, and since DisplayPort is native to the Thunderbolt spec, that connector makes much more sense. You may nonetheless use an lively adapter if you happen to completely want to attach through HDMI.

Upsides

To be clear, the TS5 Plus characteristic extra upsides than downsides, as outlined all through this publish.

1. It’s a one-cable resolution for all your Mac’s peripherals
2. It options Thunderbolt 5 connectivity, which is double the pace of Thunderbolt 4, options Show Port 2.1, and Bandwidth Enhance for prime decision or excessive body price shows.
3. 140W quick charging on your MacBook Professional that doesn’t throttle down when different gadgets are linked.
4. Seven USB-C ports in all, with three of these ports able to charging gadgets at 36W.
5. 10Gb Ethernet connectivity, nice for connecting to a NAS.
6. Twin USB controllers to forestall bottlenecking with a number of USB SSDs.
7. A smooth, silent design that dissipates warmth, and will be oriented each horizontally and vertically.

9to5Mac’s Take

CalDigit’s TS5 Plus is the very best Thunderbolt dock that you just can at present buy [Note: The TS5 is out of stock until early June. We’ll update this post once it’s available.], however as such, it is available in at an eye-watering value level of $499.99. That’s a steep value to pay, and falls far outdoors of impulse-buy territory.

That being mentioned, there’s merely nothing else available on the market that competes with this dock by way of present options, and even if you happen to don’t but personal a Thunderbolt 5-capable machine, it ought to serve you properly for years to come back. This dock enables you to get full pace charging, monitor connectivity, 10GbE, Thunderbolt 5 accent connectivity, alongside connections to many extra peripherals, all through a single cable connection. For MacBook Professional homeowners, it’s a fairly superior machine.

Like its predecessor, the CalDigit TS5 Plus contains all the pieces, however this time throws in all the kitchen sink for good measure. If you will get over the admittedly steep value, and wish to future proof your setup, then the TS5 Plus is a stable buy, nevertheless the TS4 will nonetheless present greater than sufficient punch for many common customers, will be discovered cheaper, and is definitely accessible in inventory.

…Otherwise you may select to attend for the common TS5. As talked about on the outset, CalDigit plans to launch a base TS5 with much less ports for much less cash. But, the common TS5 will nonetheless embrace Thunderbolt 5, 140W host charging, and can even have another Thunderbolt 5 port than the TS5 Plus. However it’s going to lack 10GbE, 36W USB-C ports, and different options like twin USB-C controllers. I simply bought my fingers on the common TS5, and might be again shortly with a full breakdown and comparability.

Do you employ a dock together with your Mac? Would you contemplate the TS5 Plus? Pontificate within the feedback together with your ideas.