In this video I am going to show you how to maximise the power of your new M1 Pro (or
M1 Max) MacBook Pro. That’s a silly claim I know.
But it’s true, these machines are out of this world in terms of performance but if
you are a busy bee professional, a creative, photographer, video editor, music producer,
I know within a few days of getting this machine you will be thinking…
Oh I wish it had a way of doing this, or I wish I could hook this up to even more of
my devices.
Or... if only I could elevate this a little bit so I could enjoy that beautiful Liquid
Retina XDR display a bit more. I wish the camera angle was a bit better.
Well, I think this is the right video for you.
I am Alex and I do down to earth tech reviews.
OWC Thunderbolt 4 dock Starting with some this incredible THUNDERBOLT
4 Dock by OWC. I emphasise the Thunderbolt 4 because… That’s a big deal.
There's not many options out there with Thunderbolt 4 AND this number of ports.
You ARE getting 7GB p/s throughput when using the internal SSD. And off the bat, nothing
will give you that speed. But with this Thunderbolt 4 dock, you are gonna give your external SSDs
the best shot of getting close to their advertised speeds.
I did a couple of tests which I will show you in a minute.
The main reason for ME to use this dock is to be able to use my external SSDs. Doing
all this creative work, I move a lot of files around between my camera, SD cards, external
drives and the laptop...
And like you... you know, we’re all busy…
Waiting for files to be transferred when you bought this incredible MacBook Pro can be
frustrating! So I think is worth trying to shave any time in transfer speeds and simplify
the workflow as much as possible.
As they say... Time is money!
I tried a few other hubs too, but this right now tops it for me. Because the other neat
feature it has... is the number of ports.
You are getting this Thunderbolt HOST port at the front which has the power delivery
to charge your MacBook Pro at 96 Watt.
But at the back… you are getting THREE. That’s right.. 3 extra Thunderbolt 4 USB-C
ports.
And of course these are all backwards compatible so your devices don’t have to HAVE Thunderbolt
4, they can be Thunderbolt 3 or older too.
Transfer test Using a bog standard Sandisk SSD, so not the
fastest drives you can get… I was able to get 710 MB/s.
In plain English, a 200GB folder took just under 4 minutes.
That is pretty good, considering their advertised speed of 1000 MB/s. I think that is as close
as you’re gonna get really. Connecting directly to the MacBook Pro was only 70 MB/s faster
which translated into 30 seconds faster overall...
to transfer that same 200 GB folder. So not a major deal, and it's quite nice to have
that SSD drive tucked away out of sight.
Which brings me to the other benefit of using the dock...
Which is of course that the cables and hard drives can be out of the way keeping your
setup much more aesthetically pleasing.
OWC also have this really cool DOCK EJECTOR app.
It allows you to eject all drives at once.
So you don’t get macOS nagging at you... with their passive aggressive pop ups “oooo
Disk not eject properly” You’re a naughty boy!
Or girl! I know you all like unplugging things from time to time… nevermind
Aaaaaanyway!
With this little dock ejector app, a couple of clicks is ALL you need to do when you finished
your work and you want to chill with your laptop somewhere else… or you want to quickly
undock your laptop during the day so you can go to Starbucks or whatever.
Really useful app, and well thought through. It’s all the small details you know, that
make the experience that much better!
The standard USB Type A ports are not to be sniffed at either… The ones at the back
are all 10Gb/s ports rather than the usual 5GB that you get in some devices and even
Apple laptops.
Display support What about display support? If you are a creative
or a gamer or just someone who has multiple monitors, you're gonna love this!
This dock can support up to TWO X 4K displays at up 60Hz but it can also support a single
5, 6 or even 8K display at 30Hz. Now I don’t have a 4K display or multiple monitors to
test...
But this sounds like a really neat feature.
The power brick is fairly large, a bit like a laptop brick so you might want to consider
hiding it under your desk like I did, for that cleaner look under the desk.
Front At the front you have support for audio jack
in and out so again, if you don’t want to connect straight into your Mac and keep your
desk clean of cables this is one less cable to worry about if you are using a headset
or a pair of cabled headphones for example.
I know the MacBook has an SD card reader now - (thanks Apple for giving that back) - but
I know you might have multiple cameras in which case this will be very handy when you
are busy transferring your photos and videos.
It’s always nice to have even MORE ports to get us working faster.
What’s that little hole at the front? (Not a question you hear every day…)
THAT controls the LED brightness. If you don’t like how that blue light looks, you can either
turn it down or turn it completely off!
At the front you get YET another USB type A for more convenient access and charging.
I personally just use this one for my Logitech mouse receiver.
I normally just use bluetooth if I have to take it away, but if I ever have to remove
that it’s easy enough to get to. I don’t have to be reaching at the back and making
sure I am not disconnecting the wrong thing.
OWC Thunderbolt 4 hub In case that dock is too much for you... there
is something else that might suit you better.
This little beauty right here is the OWC Thunderbolt 4 Hub.
I love this thing and I’ve been using this one since April 2021, mostly to extend the
thunderbolt port I have on the M1 iPad Pro.
But this guy can also power your MacBook Pro at 60 Watt and... just like the Dock, this
hub has THREE Thunderbolt 4 ports at the back.
That’s gonna give you up to 40GB/s throughput so you can use it to connect multiple 4K displays
or a single 5K, 6K or even 8K display.
Not only that, you can create three independent daisy chains where you are able to disconnect
ANY device from one chain---- without affecting or disconnecting the others.
From a design perspective, whether you are going wit the dock for that... "All in one"
solution for your desk...
Or with the hub if you don’t need all of those extra ports. They both look very stylish,
very minimal and look great with that brushed aluminium finish...and that glossy black top.
I absolutely love that they come with 3 usable Thunderbolt 4 ports, IN ADDITION to that host
port at the front which we use power the laptop.
It IS a bit of a pain to have that at the front, but it doesn’t bother me as much
as it did to start with.
Satechi Hybrid SSD enclosure This next item is a smaller solution and looks
just like a dongle right? Wrong…
Yes it is a dongle with HDMI, 100W PD Power delivery UBC-C port but also…
Has this secret compartment here for a M.2 SATA SSD storage.
So you can expand your MacBook storage and the number of ports you have, all in one device.
The only..SMALL criticism I have (and this may not be important to you) is that it doesn’t
have an SD card reader, here.
That would make this device perfect for me, but it’s still a very compelling solution
when you consider that it’s also an external Storage device.
I still carry this with me because it does provide me something that is extremely mobile
and like I said, that extra storage… It’s extremely handy to have. Whether I am using
the MacBook Pro or just my M1 iPad Pro.
Satechi Stand The next accessory I have here is actually
very low tech and one that I was really sceptical at first. But after using this for the last
2-3 months… I really can’t see me NOT using them.
Having the Mac elevated, even if it’s just a few inches makes a HUGE difference for me.
Even though I love typing on the new MacBook, I have my own Bluetooth keyboard so having
the laptop higher up when I am not connected to my Ultrawide monitor is really helpful,
much more comfortable!
But there’s a second reason I like this stand!
Ok, one of the greatest things about the new MacBook Pro’s is the new camera. We now
finally have a camera that is not a potato. This is a fully fledged, 21st century approved
1080p webcam.
Jokes aside, the zoom calls are much better now. But there is one problem.
Like any laptop, the angle on this camera… really SUCKS!
It’s much more flattering to have the camera a bit closer to eye level.
This could be a personal thing of course, but for me I much prefer that elevated angle.
MOFT sit-stand stands And talking about elevation and different
angles… These next accessories from MOFT are great for that.
MOFT foldable stand If you are looking for something a little
more discrete and that you can carry with you…
MOFT sleeve
And also from MOFT we have this sleeve which is a stand and can work as storage too.
Bluetooth keyboard In terms of Bluetooth keyboards, I was going
to recommend this Keychron K1. But I had a major issue with it recently.
After about 6 months the battery which was incredible… It’s a 5000 maH battery! It’s
now not holding the charge for more than a few hours. Really disappointing so I can’t
recommend it right now.
It could be that I got a bad unit, I haven’t contacted the brand yet but when I do I will
let you know.
It’s one of those things, if you asked me 2 months ago I would say, absolutely go and
get one. Really nice size keyboard, especially for Mac users because it is exactly the same
size as the keyboard on the MacBook Pro 16 inch… But yeah that battery issue is concerning
me.
So I will be on the lookout for a new keyboard or a replacement soon. If you know a good
one to recommend, please let me know in the comments.
I hope this was useful, and I will see you and your smiling faces on the next one!