I found a dual-display USB-C dock with 8 ports - and no bulky AC brick

'ZDNET Recommends': What exactly does it mean?

ZDNET's recommendations are based on many hours of testing, research, and comparison shopping. We gather data from the best available sources, including vendor and retailer listings as well as other relevant and independent reviews sites. And we pore over customer reviews to find out what matters to real people who already own and use the products and services we’re assessing.

When you click through from our site to a retailer and buy a product or service, we may earn affiliate commissions. This helps support our work, but does not affect what we cover or how, and it does not affect the price you pay. Neither ZDNET nor the author are compensated for these independent reviews. Indeed, we follow strict guidelines that ensure our editorial content is never influenced by advertisers.

ZDNET's editorial team writes on behalf of you, our reader. Our goal is to deliver the most accurate information and the most knowledgeable advice possible in order to help you make smarter buying decisions on tech gear and a wide array of products and services. Our editors thoroughly review and fact-check every article to ensure that our content meets the highest standards. If we have made an error or published misleading information, we will correct or clarify the article. If you see inaccuracies in our content, please report the mistake via this form .

Follow ZDNET: Add us as a preferred source on Google.

While manufacturers want to slim down the number of ports on laptops and desktop systems to save a few bucks, the demand for them among end users has never been higher.

The obvious solution is to throw a dock into the equation, but these are always a compromise, and the trick is to pick a dock that brings the most to the table with a minimum of compromises.

Also: My favorite USB-C accessory of all time has a magnetic superpower (and is priced well)

This is especially true of a portable dock because the last thing you want to end up buying is a dock that requires a huge AC power brick weighing a couple of pounds.

For the past couple of months, I've been using EZQuest's Pro Series USB 4 Dual Display 8-in-1 hub , and with one additional accessory, it's replaced all my other docks.

An 8-in-1 hub with dual-display support that's highly portable and perfect for use at home, in the office, and on the road.

It's powered by Intel's "Hoover Ridge" JHL8140 chipset, a cut-down (another phrase for cost-reduced) version of Intel's JHL8440 "Goshen Ridge" chip that's found in many of the big, fully featured Thunderbolt 4 docks. The drawback of the JHL8440 is that docks built around this chipset need an external power brick. That's fine for desktop use, but it's not portable or particularly friendly when it comes to travel.