Belkin, one of our favorite accessory companies, is showing off a host of new products at CES 2018. Among them are new wireless charging offerings, a new power bank and a power delivery wall charging collection. They all arrive this spring and summer. Here’s a quick rundown of some of what they will have on hand.
If you could choose only one battery pack for your next long haul flight, the mophie powerstation AC should probably be it. Mophie’s powerstation AC is a high-capacity external battery with AC power as well as USB-C PD fast charging for laptops, tablets, smartphones. You heard that right, this is a battery pack that’s powerful enough to charge all your devices, and your laptop too.
Readers who have read my reviews here at Gear Diary or over on my site know that I travel. A lot. The bulk of my career has seen me travel to every lower 48 state and to many other destinations around the globe.
We’ve reviewed many portable battery packs here, but the SYNAVOLT is the first I’ve ever seen that is both expandable and modular. Currently raising funds on Indiegogo, SYNAVOLT starts with a 20,000mAh base unit; it has two slotted expansion bay ends that can handle a variety of power-enabled modular attachments.
I have had a Blue Yeti of some sort for years, and while the mic comes with its own stand, it’s one designed to only work on your desk. I’ve often found there doesn’t really seem to be a good place for the mic with its stock stand. This changed when I received the OnePlus Upgraded Mic Arm Stand.
From the beginning, the JBL Pulse line has been made up of excellent portable speakers which happen to include a light show. But it wasn’t until the Pulse 3 that the design became sophisticated. The JBL Pulse 3 looks like the love child of a portable Bluetooth speaker and a fancier lava lamp, and it’s one pretty baby.
If you’ve got an iPhone, or one of the newer Android phones, a MacBook, or many of the newer Windows computers, then you need all of the USB Type-C cables you can get your hands on. When you’re ready to upgrade to the best, Nomad has you covered with their new Universal Cable and 4-in-1 USB C Cable.
The LandingZone has announced what they call “the most powerful Apple MacBook docking station to-date.” It just might be. This new docking station offers an oh-so-awesome 16 different ports and can turn your MacBook Pro with Touch Bar into a powerful workstation. At $299 it is pricey, but the added functionality is unparalleled if you want an impressive desktop computer.
So let’s be honest. A mouse is a mouse is a mouse. Right? Well, maybe not so much. Technically, a mouse pretty much does the same thing when it was conceived in the 1970s but the innards of the device itself, along with the way they connect to your PC or Mac.
After using MacBooks for the better part of twelve years, when I finally received a standing desk, I knew for a fact I wanted a functional monitor that could stand as a larger display for my 2016 MacBook Pro. And I believe I’ve found just that in the Ben-Q Eye-Care Monitor (EW2770QZ). At 27 inches, the BenQ Eye Care Monitor meets most of my needs that I’ll dive into a bit later; for now, here are some of the official specs as listed by BenQ: Panel LCD Size (inch) 27″ Aspect Ratio 16:9 Resolution (max.) 2560 x 1440 Display Area(mm)…
Samson QH4 is one of those products designed for professional musicians but also makes sense for non-professionals who simply want to share their music with others while wearing headphones. The Samson QH4 is “a 4-channel headphone amplifier designed to distribute your audio to up to four individual headphones, each with its own volume control.” And there’s much more.
As an owner of a standing desk, chances are there are actual cases where you will be standing for long periods of time, typing your life away. The surface beneath your feet can eventually hurt your feet, so why not get yourself a nice floor mat? Fully’s got your back in this regard.
It’s a well-known fact that raising your laptop to a better viewing height and adding a keyboard will improve your posture and help your back and neck. What you use to raise your screen opens up a ton of possibilities. We’ve seen plenty of metal stands, but here’s something new and elegant — the Galen Leather Walnut Wood MacBook Stand.
It seems as if USB-C is going to be the wave of the future, and with that being the case, a lot of traditional devices that came with USB 3.0 will be all but obsolete in the not-so-distant future. This includes the external hard drives that we use today.
I recently “renovated” my home office. It now has a new 13” MacBook Pro, an UPLIFT standing desk from HumanSolution, a big beautiful monitor from AOC and AudioEngine HD3 Bookshelf speakers. Key to this setup, however, is the Belkin Thunderbolt 3 Express Dock HD with Cable. At $349.99 it is pricey, but it turns my laptop into an amazing desktop.
It’s not very often that I open a box and have to stop what I’m doing to inhale the fragrant smell of fine leather wafting as I unwrap the contents, but that’s exactly what happened when I recently opened a package from Galen Leather. What was inside the box? Beautiful cases for my iPhone, 12″ MacBook, and 13″ MacBook Pro.
If you need to carry a high-capacity external drive with you when you travel or go to work, you’ll likely be interested in making that memory device as small as possible. Take a look at the Western Digital My Passport SSD; it’s 1 Terabyte, rated for 515MB/s, and it measures just 3.6″ long by 1.8″ wide by 0.4″ thick.
Ever since I finally received my standing desk by Fully, there was one other item that I knew my setup needed to make it complete: the OWC Thunderbolt 3 Dock. OWC announced that they would be creating their Thunderbolt 3 Dock way back in 2016 when the MacBook Pro was announced, and after a few delays, and a lot of other reviews of standalone imitators, the popular Mac vendor sent over their Thunderbolt 3 Dock. Promising to deliver more connectivity, power and charging capability than the previous Thunderbolt 2 Dock, the Thunderbolt 3 Dock is a “what can I not do”…
It’s not often that a monitor really piques my interest, but the Dell UltraSharp 38 Curved Monitor has done just that. The company’s first 37.5 ultrawide curved screen monitor will be perfect for anyone who needs a lot of screen room while using multiple windows.
If you have a 2016 MacBook Pro, you may want to consider picking up one of Belkin’s new Thunderbolt 3 Express Dock HD with Cable. The new Express Dock is fast. It is powerful. And, with just a single cable, it turns your MacBook into a desktop. At $349.99 it’s pricey, but it is a serious piece of hardware.
A couple of months ago I reviewed CharjenPro’s USB-C 5-in-1 hub for the MacBook Pro. It was an absolutely great accessory for the 2016 Macbook Pro that gives you a lot of the functionality that Apple stripped away when they went all USB-C for their latest Macbook.