UGREEN Revodok Maxidok 17-in-1 Thunderbolt 5 Docking Station

"UGREEN Revodok Maxidok 17-in-1 Thunderbolt 5 Docking Station". Yes, that's what it's called. In a way, it's "just" a Thunderbolt 5 dock, you know, like the ones we've reviewed before, but UGREEN feels it's necessary to give it two different names that both end in "dok."

That said, there's actually a pretty professional piece of kit behind this truly crazy name. Okay, so with a dock, it's pretty much all about speeds and port selection, so let's start there. This little square box offers two card readers, TF and SD 4.0, three 10Gbps USB-C ports, a 3.5-millimetre combo jack, and split audio on the back, three 10Gbps USB-A ports, 2.5G Ethernet, DisplayPort 2.1, two Thunderbolt 5 ports, and a Thunderbolt 5 upstream port for the device being connected. There's also an NVMe PCIe Gen 4 slot that can accommodate up to 8TB of dedicated storage expansion.

The idea, of course, is to connect a laptop, which is charged at 140W from the 240W power supply, which too is more than enough for fast charging across various brands. The only thing you'll notice is missing is HDMI, which is obviously a drawback if HDMI plays a crucial role in your setup.

The unit is encased in a zinc-aluminium alloy and features perforated sides for passive cooling, as well as a temperature-controlled fan. This means it looks a bit like a serious mini-PC rather than a Thunderbolt dock, and that's certainly a compliment. It looks the part and performs accordingly.

Of course, there are a few minor issues to point out here. We plugged in an M.2 drive that, in theory, should perform at close to 6000 MB/s, but we measured about half that, which is likely due to the internal bandwidth. Additionally, one could argue that 2.5GbE Ethernet is on the slow side, and that 10GbE should be expected in a flagship device like this. And then there's that missing HDMI port.

That's enough to sour the experience a bit. The Revodok Maxidok 17-in-1 looks like a dock that has it all, but it doesn't, despite costing a good £420. However, that's not enough to make this dock unrecommendable. If you're willing to sacrifice HDMI and accept slightly lower Ethernet speeds, you'll get a pretty powerful powerhouse that turns a laptop into a desktop with overwhelmingly expanded functionality.