The maximum that the host connection can provide is 60W, leaving 50W divided between the four other ports.Įach Thunderbolt 4.0 port can hand down 15W, and the USB 3.2 Gen 2 7.5W, so there is a minor oversubscription, but not enough to cause a problem, hopefully.Ī more significant issue is that many of the higher specification laptops we have seen recently need 85W or 87W to charge quickly by being used, and the 60W here isn’t enough. With the bandwidth to external devices unchanged from Thunderbolt 3, what we found most interesting about this design, and potential weakness is the power distribution.Īs we already mentioned, the Hub comes with a chunky PSU that can deliver 5.5A at 20V, that works out to 110W to distribute between any connected devices. (Image credit: Other World Computing, Inc. Apple even makes a Thunderbolt 3 (USB-C) to Thunderbolt 2 adapter, enabling even older technology to work with this hardware. On the front is the Thunderbolt 4 (USB-C) connection intended to connect the computer for both data transfers and charging (up to 60W), and a single USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-A port with high power charging.Īt the rear are three more Thunderbolt 4 (USB-C) ports, enabling the Hub to support multiple monitors through cable adapters to cascade down to Thunderbolt 3 or 4 devices. However, as we dug into the Hub's specifications, we realised a good reason why it needs to be this big that we’ll discuss later.

While we accept that only the small part of this package will probably be visible on the desk, the disparity between them is odd. But conversely, the 5.5A PSU that powers it is much larger than the Hub, being over 15cm long. Out of the box, we were immediately struck by how small this device is, being just 11.8 cm wide and 7.3 cm deep.

We should point out that while OWC is a traditional supporter of Apple hardware, at this moment, Thunderbolt 4 is only available on PC’s made by other brands. That’s precisely the niche that the OWC Thunderbolt Hub hopes to occupy, as it provides a means to expand the port potential of any machine with Thunderbolt 3/4 or USB-C 4.0 technology.

Thunderbolt 3 hub mac