My setup is resulting in a mouse that lags (severely sometimes). Occasionally, this is absent, but more often then not it lags and is slow to respond only on the external monitors. Have updated the Displaylink software, and pushed everything through the NVIDIA video card within my Surfacebook. Any ideas?
Hi Peter,
Thanks for reaching out to us, I am sorry this is not working as expected.
I would like to start by getting some additional details to help narrow down the cause of the cursor delay.
Is this a wired or wireless mouse? If wireless is the receiver connected to the docking station or directly to the computer?
Are applications similarly lagging on the external displays, for example, while the mouse is lagging can you launch a Youtube video and move it to the external to see if it is similarly affected?
Does the reduced mouse performance seem to correspond to any specific software or activity on the computer or is it appear at random times?
Thank you for the additional details.
Pat
Plugable Technology
support@plugable.com
Hi Pat
This is a Bluetooth mouse connected directly to the computer. Some other applications lag from time to time on the external displays.
I would have hoped for a much smoother experience using the docking station and I am disappointed that this is not the case.
The applications and mouse cursor only lags on the external screens connected to the docking station, and not on the main display.
b/w Peter
Hi Peter,
Thank you for the additional details, the USB graphics adapter will have reduced performance compared to a directly connected display or the internal display. This is caused by two main factors, first the USB 3.0 connection only provides up to 5Gb/s bandwidth to drive the external displays, this is less than either HDMI or DisplayPort provides, to minimize the affects of the limited bandwidth the DisplayLink software compresses the video signal and only sends changes from one frame to the next to the external display. This offers best performance when only small areas of the displays are changing continuously, or large areas are only rarely changed. For example moving the mouse around on the desktop only changes a very small area of the screen but it is updated very quickly, at 60 times per second, while playing back a full screen video changes quite a large area and requires significantly more bandwidth.
The second factor is the graphics software itself, the DisplayLink software has reduced access to hardware resources compared to the internal graphics controller. This limited access to resources normally only affects graphics dependent applications like 2D or 3D graphics applications, video editing software, and some stock trading applications which rely on the graphics hardware to draw graphics and the interface.
Is the mouse lag happening when specific applications are running on the external displays, or at just the desktop? We normally recommend our USB 3 docking stations for use with office and web browsing software as this generally behaves very well with the limitations of USB graphics.
We can get some additional information from your system to help determine if there may be a software component that is out of date or potentially causing the performance problems.
If you would, please keep the dock connected and monitor(s) attached and attach the output of our diagnostic utility PlugDebug ( http://plugable.com/support/plugdebug ) to an email to ‘support@plugable.com’ with the subject line ‘Ticket #279399 - Attention Pat’ as this will allow us to examine some log files from your system to help determine the next steps.
Thanks,
Pat
Plugable Technologies
Thanks Pat, I’ll try that and see how I get on.
I have to say again that I am disappointed with the technology as the product is not really performing as expected. I appreciate that this might be irritating, but you really should be putting clearer warnings on the box that the equipment may not actually perform or work as intended to ensure that consumers are well informed about the problems with this kit. Specifically, if you clearly stated on the box this this docking station is only recommended for use with office and web browsing, I would not have purchased it.
The lag on the screen is a little hard to predict at times, but only happens on the external displays. As for a specific application, I haven’t noted this; most of the time I am just doing office related stuff, but other times I am crunching data etc.
Hi Peter,
Thank you for replying, I am sorry about the performance, we do call this out on our product page and Amazon listing. I would be happy to help returning the docking station, please send me your Amazon Order ID ( available from Amazon.com/orders ) via email to ‘support@plugable.com’ with the subject line ‘Ticket #279399 - Attention Pat’ and I can verify the purchase and start the return process.
In your first email you mention having a Microsoft Surface Book, can you confirm if this is the first gen, or second gen surface book? I can check to see if we have any docking stations that will provide a better display experience with this system.
Thank you,
Pat
Plugable Technologies
Thanks Pat - I have sent you a log file, so there might be a chance you can sort. If not, I will look to return. It is a first gen Surfacebook, and anything that will drive two 4k monitors robustly would make my day.
Thanks
Hi Peter,
Thanks for sending the log file, I have had a chance to take a look. The Windows MSINFO32.exe application failed to gather its log files in a reasonable time and the log was not attached, this normally has the most detailed system information. I was able to confirm the DisplayLink software is up to date and the system drivers appear to be up to date for the releases from Microsoft.
Based on this there is little that can be done with this docking station to improve performance, ironically the docking station may actually perform better with the NVIDIA graphics disabled as the Intel HD Graphics driver provides for better low level hardware access to the DisplayLink software than NVIDIA does, but I doubt the performance would be significantly improved.
As for the best docking station for the Surface Book 1, unfortunatly this system is not compatible with our USB-C docking stations and the best option is probably the Microsoft Surface Dock. The Surface Dock provides two miniDisplayPort outputs that can be converted to HDMI using miniDisplayPort to HDMI Active Adapters ( https://plugable.com/products/mdp-hdmi ) or to DisplayPort using separate miniDispayPort to DisplayPort cables.
Please let me know if you would like to go ahead with the return and I can get started right away.
Thank you,
Pat
Plugable Technology
Hello Peter,
We’re closing this thread due to inactivity, but if you have any further questions please feel free to contact support@plugable.com and we’ll be happy to help.
Thanks,
Pat
Plugable Technologies