[GTALUG] Portable Monitors

[Giles Orr]

Hi Nick.

I ran into a similar-ish problem about a year ago.  Sat down at a desk
at TPL and plugged my Mac into the Dell docking bay attached to a Dell
monitor ... and nothing happened.  I was informed by local staff that
this was expected - because Dell uses a proprietary style of docking
bay (standard USB-C port, non-standard behaviour).  Essentially, it
doesn't work unless you have a Dell laptop.

Dell sometimes makes good products.  But I've been bitten by their
inclination to "proprietary and our way is best" often enough that I
avoid their products on principle and assume that problems like this
are a result of choices they made.  This may not be true, but you
should look into how that "engineering laptop" of yours is designed
and what it supports instead of assuming that the portable monitor was
at fault.  I bet it would work with a Dell portable monitor ...

Kind of hard for me to whinge about proprietary lock-in in the same
sentence in which I admit I was using a Mac - but Apple has always
been very clear that they have a walled garden (and they fully follow
the USB-C spec).  Dell doesn't make their proprietary behaviour clear.

On Wed, 31 Jul 2024 at 15:05, Nick Accad via talk <talk at gtalug.org> wrote:
>
>
>
> On Wed, Jul 31, 2024 at 13:57 D. Hugh Redelmeier via talk <talk at gtalug.org> wrote:
>>
>> > From: Nick Accad via talk <talk at gtalug.org>
>>
>> > 3. I ended up getting this:
>> > https://www.arzopa.com/collections/hot-deals/products/s1-table-15-6-fhd-portable-monitor
>> >
>> > It worked.. "OK", niot great, my main complaint is that the USB-C
>> > connection is a hit or miss, it worked on an Android phone for example, but
>> > it did not work on my souped up Dell/Windows laptop, and the support
>> > response is "just use USB-C for power and use the HDMI for display". Yup,
>> > it's going back.
>>
>> The display specs say:
>>   Input Interface: Mini HD(Video Signal), Type-C Full Function(Video
>>         Data, Power Supply ISDN),
>>
>> I don't know what Mini HD is, but I would guess that it is really Mini
>> HDMI.
>> <https://www.howtogeek.com/745530/hdmi-vs-mini-hdmi-vs-micro-hdmi-whats-the-difference/>
>>
>> Mini HDMI isn't that common.  I think Raspberry Pi uses it.
>>
>> USB 3.x can and often does support Power Delivery, and DisplayPort at
>> the same time.
>>
>> If your computer is new enough, you only need a USB C male-to-male cab.
>>
>> If not, you need a Mini HDMI cable and a USB C charger.
>>
>> Or did I misunderstand somehting?
>> ---
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>
>
> Nope you got it, the usb-c to my laptop didn’t even detect a device. And my laptop is really top of the line, we get what we call “engineering laptops” from Dell, mine is not even a year old.
>
> I could technically get a usb-c to hdmi adapter, but I was hoping for a single cable a la thunderbolt.
>
> I’ll check in later if I find something that works
>
>
> ---
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-- 
Giles
https://www.gilesorr.com/
gilesorr at gmail.com