What is a docking station?

[Odin5578]

... well that's my question: What is a docking station?

 

[Alvin.C]

Re:

Hello,

A docking station provides extra ports and hardware for laptops. Most laptops have a docking port on the underside, which docks to a connector on a docking station.

A port replicator is kind of the same thing, however by definition port replicators don't have expansion slots as docking stations do by definition. Though, many use them as interchangeable terms.

 

[Trifid]

Or anything that plugs in. Like the charging docking station for a mouse.

Is it me, or does anyone else think they could have easily fitted those ports onto that laptop? With out the docking station....

 

[Trotter]

Is it me, or does anyone else think they could have easily fitted those ports onto that laptop? With out the docking station....

But then they couldn't charge you for a docking station... See, makes sense now, huh?

 

[Trifid]

Completely (sadly), they could make nice profits out of them... Not so good for the consumer, especially having the ugly lump on the bottom.

 

[Odin5578]

Could you use a docking stationg to up the graphics?

 

[Chankama]

The primary reason for a "docking station" is for "docking".. Which means, when you have a whole buncha peripherals connected to your unit, whenever you go somewhere and come back, you don't want to connect all the stuff again to the laptop.. Monitor, serial cable, parallel cable, USB, keyboard, etc. etc. etc.

For those ppl that use a laptop as their sole computer, they can just come home and "plug it in" to the docking station, and then it feels like a normal desktop computer, without the hassle of connecting everything to the laptop. ..