Comments by "Javier Flores" (@JJFlores197) on "Laptop Docks! They're pretty neat!" video.

You just have to adjust the sleep settings so that it doesn't sleep when you close the lid.
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More or less. Whether or not its worth is mainly dependent on how you use your laptop. For example, I work in school IT support. We primarily use HP ProBook and Lenovo Thinkpads for our teachers and staff and we use docks. A typical setup consists of: laptop, dock, video cable for projector or interactive display (HDMI or VGA), USB cable from SMART Board/IFP to laptop, audio cable, power to dock, USB mouse, USB document camera, and ethernet cable. That's at least 6 cables that would need to be plugged and unplugged every time a teacher comes and goes from their classroom. A lot of our teachers are not very tech savvy so plugging and unplugging cables is a burden to them. We plug all of that into the dock and they just have to plug a single USB-C cable that comes from the docking station to their laptop. That's it. Of course, that's just 1 use case. If you don't mind plugging and unplugging cables, a dock may not be of benefit to you, but everyone's use case is different.
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@TheChibiZel Yep. I work in school IT support and all of our teachers use laptops with docks. For them, it is much easier to plug in a single USB-C cable from their dock to their laptop instead of plugging/unplugging a video cable, network cable, USB cables (for mice/kb, document camera, SMART Board touch cable), power cable, and audio cable every single time. We plug all of their devices/peripherals to the dock and just tell them to plug the type C cable to their laptop. Pretty simple and efficient for them.
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If you need to move around regularly and have a lot of peripherals, it can be a hassle having to plug in and unplug all of your cables. I work in school IT and pretty much all of our teachers have laptops wit docks. We plug in the video cables, USB dock, speakers, external mice/keyboard (if necessary), and Ethernet into the docking station. It makes it much easier for teachers to plug/unplug 1 cable instead of figuring out where 5 or 6 different cables go.
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@BigWill3855 Unless ZBooks are different (which I doubt), and its running Windows, you should be able to go to Control Panel>Hardware and Sound>Power options>Change what closing the lid does>Change the "When I close the lid" option to "Do nothing" on the plugged in column. Save and you should now be able to close the screen without it going to sleep.
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I agree. I work in school IT. We have a rather large fleet of HP ProBook 650 G2s w/ a 6th gen i5 that we're slowly replacing. They're still pretty viable for a lot of our staff's use cases. Most of them have been upgraded to 8GB of RAM and an SSD and they still perform good enough.
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I don't know dude. I had "fun" issues getting a Lenovo USB-C dock to work with my Lenovo laptop running Linux Mint. It certainly wasn't as simple as just plugging it in. I mean the USB portion worked fine, but getting video to work through the dock was a "fun" process...
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It largely depends on your use case. I work in school IT support. The majority of our staff use laptops with docks. We have a mix of HP Slimline docks and Lenovo USB-C docks. We're slowly moving away from HP laptops. For a teacher, it is much easier to plug their laptop into their dock than have to plug and unplug in their video cable for the Smartboard/projector, USB cable for smart board, doc camera, ethernet, audio cable, every single day. With the dock, it just makes everything much simpler for them.
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The advantage depends on how often you take your laptop on the go and how many things you have plugged into it. I work in school IT support for a school district. All of our teachers have laptops with docks. On average, they have about 7 cables plugged into their setup: Video cable for projector/interactive display; USB cable for touch functionality from SMART Board/TV, power cable, ethernet cable, speaker cable, document camera, and occasionally another video cable for a 3rd display. Its not exactly difficult to plug and unplug those cables regularly, but it does become a hassle at times. What we do is to connect all of those cables into a Lenovo USB-C dock and then run a USB-C cable from the dock to the laptop. That way, the teacher only has to plug/unplug a single cable. If you never move your laptop and/or don't have many things plugged into it, a dock likely won't be of benefit. however, it does greatly help if you regularly take your laptop with you to other places AND have many peripherals plugged into it.
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I'm waiting for a 15.6" model.
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Its just different use cases. I work in school IT support and we have ThinkPads and USB-C docks for most staff members. Most of our staff is not very tech savvy. Some get very confused seeing a bunch of cables. On average, our teaching staff have: 1 HDMI cable or VGA cable going to a projector/Interactive display, 1 USB touch cable, 1 ethernet cable, 1 power cable, 1 USB keyboard, 1 USB mouse, 1 speaker cable (3.5mm cable). That's at least 7 cables they would need to plug and unplug each time they bring/take their laptop to and from their classroom. As I said, most are not tech savvy and they can get flustered. We plug all that into the USB-C dock so that they only have 1 cable to worry about: the USB-C cable.
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I work in school tech support and we are about half way there in transitioning to USB-C docks. We're moving from HP Probooks that use a slimline dock to Lenovo Thinkpads that use a hybrid USB-C dock. This will eventually make connecting different teachers/substitute laptops seamless across our schools. I have had a large number of times where we have a substitute teacher come in with a district-laptop that doesn't match what the teacher has. Its not super difficult to get them up and running, but it is just inefficient.
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The idea is that you plug in your peripherals to the docking station. So if you need to take your laptop on the go, you just undock your laptop and you're good to go. Without the dock, you would need to unplug everything from your laptop each time you're going to go somewhere else. If you only have a couple of things plugged, in it probably isn't much of a deal. However, if you have multiple monitors and/or USB devices plugged in, it can be a hassle to plug everything in and unplug each time you move around. For most home use cases, it probably doesn't make much sense to buy a docking station. Its primarily aimed at people who have a permanent work area and also need to take their laptop on the go quickly.
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You can certainly do that. Docking stations are generally meant when you have a permanent work area but need to take your laptop without easily. If you only have a few things plugged in, you can usually forgo the dock. But if you have multiple monitors, and peripherals it can be tedious having to plug and unplug everything if you need to take your laptop with you.
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It really depends on your use case. I work in IT support at a school district. Most of our teachers and staff use laptops. Its much easier for them to plug a single USB-C cable rather than plugging/unplugging a USB cable for SMART Board touch, HDMI/VGA cable for the projector/display, USB cable for the doc camera, speakers, ethernet cable, and power cable. We plug all of that into the dock and they just plug/unplug 1 cable. You can say that plugging stuff in is not that difficult, but it can be tedious for a lot of people who hate seeing cables and is just a hassle for a lot of them. Most of our staff is not tech savvy, so we try to make it as easy as possible for them. But, if your work environment doesn't require you to move around much from your work area, you may not necessarily benefit from a dock. Again, it depends on your specific job and what you do and if you need to take your device with you.
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The Lenovo USB-C docks we use at the school district I work at have a power button on the dock. Even or older HP docks have a power button on the dock itself.
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It depends on your work. I work in school IT support. All of our teachers have laptops and docks. It is much simpler to have all connections plug into the dock instead of having the teacher plug and unplug 6 cables all the time. For a lot of teachers, especially the older ones, that is very tedious even if to us more tech savvy people it is very easy to do. With the dock, they just have 1 cable to plug or unplug. Most of our setups consist of a Lenovo ThinkPad, a USB-C hybrid dock, a video cable to a projector or interactive display, another video cable for another display, a USB document camera, ethernet (on most setups), USB mouse (wired or wireless w/ receiver), and speakers.
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It depends on your use case. If you only have a couple of peripherals, you can likely forgo the dock. I work in school tech support. Most of our staff use laptops with docks. For teachers who need to regularly dock & undock their laptop, it makes more sense to plug all of their connections into the dock. A typical setup consists of: a video cable to their projector or interactive display, audio cable for speakers, charger, USB cable for touch functionality and occasionally another display. That would be 5 cables they would need to plug and unplug regularly. Most of our staff is not tech savvy and for them, this is pretty big burden. It makes more sense to plug most of that into the dock and just plug a single USB C cable from the dock to their laptop. Makes things easier and more efficient for them.
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