Is it possible to use the Nvidia GPU via the Plugable ud-6950z docking station? I have two identical external 4K monitors. My laptop is a Dell XPS 15 7590. Currently, I have problems using adobe products like After Effects because my monitors do not have access to the Nvidia GPU. Plugging my monitors directly into my laptop when using Adobe products would be a huge hassle and not what I was expecting when I purchased the docking station.
One of my monitors shows the settings for 60 Hz but the other monitor shows only 30 Hz options. Both monitors are identical and both are plugged into the document station. Shouldn’t they both have 60 Hz options?
Thank you for reaching out to us, I will try to answer your questions in order:
Is it possible to use the Nvidia GPU via the Plugable ud-6950z docking station? I have two identical external 4K monitors. My laptop is a Dell XPS 15 7590. Currently, I have problems using adobe products like After Effects because my monitors do not have access to the Nvidia GPU. Plugging my monitors directly into my laptop when using Adobe products would be a huge hassle and not what I was expecting when I purchased the docking station.
I am sorry, the UD-6950 series of docking stations rely on DisplayLink USB Graphics Technology which does not directly utilize the computer’s NVIDIA GPU for hardware acceleration. Instead many commands are handled in software which can reduce performance for some applications like 2D and 3D graphics software, and video editing software which are highly reliant on the graphics card for hardware acceleration.
One of my monitors shows the settings for 60 Hz but the other monitor shows only 30 Hz options. Both monitors are identical and both are plugged into the document station. Shouldn’t they both have 60 Hz options?
I would expect Windows to be able to set both displays to 60Hz, this could be caused by a difference in the cables used to connect the monitors to the docking station or a miscommunication between the computer, docking station, and the monitor.
Based on your software needs the UD-6950 docking station may not be a good fit for your computer, the Dell XPS 7590 15-inch notebook supports Thunderbolt 3 and could be capable of supporting two displays connected to a Thunderbolt 3 docking station with full hardware graphics acceleration, this would resolve the first issue, and likely the second issue at the same time.
For example our newly released TBT3-UDZ Thunderbolt 3 and USB-C Dual Display Dock with 96W Host Charging ( https://plugable.com/products/tbt3-udz ) or our very popular TBT3-UDV Thunderbolt 3 Docking Station with 60W Host Charging ( https://plugable.com/products/tbt3-udv ) with a separate USB-C graphics adapter can both support up to two connected displays and even power and charge the computer ( depending on the system’s original power supply and power requirements ).
Please feel free to contact our support team via email at ‘support@plugable.com’ with the subject line ‘Ticket #325486 - Attention Pat’ and I would be happy to get some additional details from the comptuer to work on the refresh rate issue or help start the return process for this docking station and make a detailed recommendation for a Thunderbolt 3 docking station that would be a better fit for this computer and your software requirements.