Hey guys, recently got a job with optional home office twice a week. I wanted to set up my little home office. Since I already have a PC with 2 monitors, I thought I could just buy a docking station and switch between my work laptop and my PC. Good idea? Does it affect gaming in any way? Would I have to unplug my laptop charger from the docking station every time I plug it into my PC? Thanks!
If you plug the monitors only into the dock and switch from the laptop to the desktop, that would cripple your gaming performance. If you plug both the dock and the desktop into each monitor (one DP and one HDMI, for example) and switch inputs on the monitors, that wouldn’t affect your gaming at all. You could also get a KVM to switch the monitor, mouse, and keyboard with the press of a button. That wouldn’t affect gaming performance either.
Any specifics to look out for when choosing a KVM?
Just make sure it supports the right number of monitors and has the correct ports for your monitors, mouse, and keyboard. They are simple devices that mechanically switch the active ports. Just be aware they take a lot of cables, one from the dock and desktop to the KVM for each monitor and one to each monitor from the KVM. I suppose they could reduce the signal quality, so you might need better cables if you have trouble with high resolution/refresh rate with the KVM, but I don’t think that’s likely unless you are running 4K high refresh (120Hz+) monitors.