Microsoft’s Surface line of laptops and tablets are sleek-looking but, as MacBook Pro fans have recently learned, there is sometimes a price to pay for that kind of design. Ports, in particular, are in short supply which is why Microsoft is selling its own Surface Dock to compensate. Sadly, that accessory has come up short for many users but, fortunately, a second-generation Dock may finally have most that what users have been asking for.
The current Surface Dock fails to impress many users for a couple of reasons. Design-wise, some find the cable connecting the dock to a Surface Laptop or Surface Pro too short to be comfortable. The power it delivers, a measly 95W, isn’t enough to drive both the device was well USB peripherals attached to it. And then there’s the lack of USB-C, which seems to be a Microsoft Thing.
According to the Dr. Windows site, a new Surface Dock has been spotted on a Belgian web store that addresses exactly those. In place of the older dock’s Mini Display ports are two USB-C ports that serve the same purpose and more. That’s practically the only big change you can see from the outside, aside from the longer cable, that is.
That cable still connects via the proprietary Surface Connector but will supposedly deliver 200W of power, more than twice the first-gen dock. That will definitely be more than enough for the current Surface lineup which does raise questions whether the next Surface Laptops and Surface Books will draw even more power.
Those upgrades won’t come without a literal price, of course. The listing puts the Surface Dock 2 at around $270, quite higher than the current $200. There is also a sighting of a new 127W Microsoft Power Supply which seems to also hint at a new and more power-hungry Surface computer coming soon.