USB/Thunderbolt Dock or KVM?

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Finalizing the more nitty gritty aspects of actual connectivity for my upcoming Threadripper system, I want to put the rig into another room to free up space, make looks more clean and get rid of any noise.

What do I have? I got USB-C, 10GBe and Thunderbolt. And I want to connect all my external periphery via a single cable to my rig. 2x4K display (144hz would be nice), keyboard, mouse, couple of rando low-demand USB <3.0 devices.
Connection needs about 5-10m of cable and I’m not sure these long lengths are supported for that kind of work. I heard of thunderbolt over fiber but didn’t find any products yet. I used to do this over Ethernet with ThinClients, but that was way in the past and performance was subpar. I’m literally 10years behind the curve in these things.

I’m willing to pay a premium for repeater-like products to make this work.

Is there some nice hardware (Docks, KVM, ThinClient,etc) out there to improve my desk?

Any recommendations?

edit: Found some fancy fiber thunderbolt 10m cable for the budget price of 500$. Only one manufacturer it seems. Oh how much I love monopolys…

I might as well just drill a hole to the next room saving myself 800 bucks in the process. 2qm storeroom with bad ventilation on the other side, enough for some brooms and buckets usually…but 800W thermals? I guess the journey will be a bit more complicated.

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This is similar to the setup I have (minus thunderbolt), so hopefully some tips that will be helpful.

Yes - my run is 10m over an Active DP / USB3 cable. I have MST (Multistream Transit) compatible monitors so one cable daischained two screens, but you can achieve the same with a MST hub.

Coupled with an Active USB3 cable:

… and you basically have a two cable setup. You can plug the USB3 cable into a hub or a docking station. If you have thunderbolt you can try that, but per your post, cables are a bit pricier. My setup was < £100 ( approx $150 USD).

10m is about the limit for copper cables. Above that you need optical cables, which are a bit pricier but thinner and may be easier to route.

If you are happy with 2 cables rather than one, this option may be a lot cheaper but gives the same outcome.

Good luck

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I knew this morning was something special :slight_smile: This looks very promising and may be the go-to solution for me. I’m not a cheap-skate, but 500$ for a freakin cable is just outrageous. Your links are much more reasonable in pricing. Only real downside for me is the lack of power to plug in my notebook to recharge. But 700EUR premium to charge a notebook? nahh :upside_down_face:

10m limit is plenty.

Thank you so much!

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