The new MacBook dock from Brydge

I recently sold my seven year old iMac, which had faithfully served as a working-from-home computer. But as I couldn’t upgrade it to macOS Big Sur and had also recently upgraded my MacBook to a MacBook Pro, I saw little future for the iMac.

Or any need to replace it.

Instead, I bought a Samsung monitor, installed by @TheFrankFlyer, and this evening, set up a MacBook Pro laptop dock from Brydge. I’ve never used a laptop dock of any kind before, so this is all new to me. But after just a few minutes, I can see the attraction.

Firstly, set-up was a breeze. Screw into two screws (with the tiny screwdriver they include in the box!), plug in the USB-C cable connected to the monitor, then drop in the MacBook. Well, not drop exactly. More like, carefully place into the dock, to avoid damage.

The immediate advantage is that it saves valuable space on the desktop. Turn a MacBook Pro on its side and it’s essentially invisible.

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There’s also no fiddling around with plugging cables in every time I want to use the monitor. The laptop is, after all, still a laptop – it gets used in the various rooms of my apartment and (post-pandemic, hopefully) can be used wherever I travel. But when working from home, I need a big screen and knowing that all it takes is a moment to place the MacBook in place and start working is reassuring.