Can you use a thunderbolt 3 dock with a laptop only capable of usb 3.1 gen 2?

Question

I have a late 2018 macbook pro (tb3) and a surface book 2 (usb 3.1 gen 2).

I was wondering if I would be able to buy a tb3 dock and have it work with both (albeit with bandwidth constraints on the sb2).

The dock would ideally be able to do at least power delivery, a single monitor, and connect a mouse/keyboard.

This would be a question for the docking station you wish to buy, whether is accepts both standard of communication or not. — Ale..chenski, Feb 9, 2019 at 5:40

Eman · Accepted Answer · 2019-02-08 15:12:59Z

0

The Macbook Pro 2018, thunderbold 3 model supports USB 3.1 gen 2, according to Apple's website here. Therefore this setup should work!

answered Feb 8, 2019 at 15:12

Eman

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The question is whether the setup will work for both the macbook and the surfacebook 2 (which doesn't not have tb3 but has 3.2 gen 2)
– Kenneth Ito
Feb 8, 2019 at 16:40
@KennethIto, you've been just explained that since both books support USB 3.x , any USB 3.x dock will work for both books.
– Ale..chenski
Feb 9, 2019 at 5:42
@Ale..chenski, that's correct but not the question. I'm asking if I can use a thunderbolt 3 dock with both (does tb3 have enough backwards compat to allow me to use the tb3 dock with a usb 3.1 gen 2 computer).
– Kenneth Ito
Feb 9, 2019 at 17:38

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