Cable Matters 4 Port USB 3 0 Switch USB Sharing Switch for 4 Computers and USBA Peripherals -

Updated: I’ve had this for 4 years and it might be the most used accessory in my desk. Very good value. Original: I have four computers at my desk, two laptops, and two desktops, and two main displays (in addition to lap top displays). I wanted to able to switch between all four computers, and fully utilize both main displays with each computer, without paying 100s of dollars for a more modern KVM switch with full HDMI pass-through for TWO displays. If you are not aware, Displays can be used through USB 3.0. A USB 3.0 path straight to a USB to HDMI converter, will allow that PC to utilize the display. Furthermore, "DisplayLink" based USB to HDMI converters exist, and allow the conversion of one USB3.0 path to two displays. This was amazing when it first came out, and is still amazing to me today. You can run a display over USB 3.0. There are other chipsets (e.g. Magic Control Technology Corporation) but as far as I can tell only DisplayLink chipsets would work with all types of operating systems. So, why do you care. With a USB hub sitting in this little dongle, you can connect your keyboard, and pass through to your DisplayLink USB to HDMI dongle. Actually, you can connect any USB device to this little switch (I connect a full USB hub) and any device on the other side (hard drives, anything). With this bit of information, you can almost do a full KVM replacement. There are some obvious caveats here. I doubt you would get full display performance through a USB 3.0 connection to your machine. But for work purposes (documentation, writing code, browsing) this is more than sufficient. And for the kind of gaming I am interested in, not really a problem. In the picture attached you can see one USB cable coming out the front left going into the SIIG Hub (which supports two displays via a DisplayLink chipset. You can buy cheaper DisplayLink devices to avoid the expense of a hub). The other USB cable coming out goes to my hub, which has a wireless keyboard and mouse dongle, and any drives (I have a DVD drive) I want to control. Press the button 1-4 and seamlessly switch between computers. Out the back 4 micro usb connectors do a USB 3.0 connection to each of the computers (the port on the far-back right is the USB-C power supply for the switch). Setting up DisplayLink on a Linux machine is non-trivial, and with Ubuntu 18.04 I couldn't get it to work. With Ubuntu 20.04 the normal install programs worked ok, though I used a "debian" install script which configured things properly. DisplayLink absolutely works with Mac and Windows and is trivial to install, so I have two windows PCs, a Mac, and Linux machine, all going through this switch. With the remote or hitting a button, I switch between machines. Awesome. So what's missing. Well, there's no audio pass-through with this type of setup, something you might get with a KVM switch; you would have to work with audio over USB, which seems to be about $12. Display outputs may be limited, as well as display refresh rates. It is relatively easy to get most of the machines working with DisplayLink, but getting Ubuntu to work was very difficult. Overall, really happy with this, and was able to dump my old 1 display SIIG KVM switch. Read more

I love this thing. It comes with everything you need to get hooked up and started. You get all the appropriate cables, including a USB A to USB C dongle, nice! It comes with a very basic remote which honestly is great. It lets you switch between outputs (1 through 4). I use this for a Windows laptop, a Windows PC, and a MacBook Pro. I can easily switch my mouse, keyboard, headphones, and microphone to either one of those with a tap of the button on the remote. It all works flawlessly. I do split screen on a Samsung 49” widescreen monitor with two of my devices and whenever I want to change from my MacBook to my Windows laptop, all I do is press a button. It’s so convenient. As you might imagine, cable management is a concern. If you’re good at cable management, it won’t be an issue for you to tuck the excess cables away neatly. For those with a SecretLab Magnus Pro table, you can hide those cables in the cable tray in the back and keep your USB switch in there too. The remote can still pick up the signal even though it may seem like there are too many obstacles. I highly recommend this to anyone and everyone. It’s made productivity so much more efficient for me when I’m in the work zone. Read more

Update: It has been three years, and it just died. Knocking off a star for longevity. The way it died was odd, it still works and swirches, but any usb port I plug it into gets overloaded and throws an error on the computer. I'm guessing the internal circuit that supplies the external power went bad. I tried different cables, different usb power supply, different computer, nothing helped. Makes me sad, this was one of the more useful devices I had on my desk. I have this set up to switch four devices between three machines (could have one more). Devices are gaming wired keyboard, wired gaming mouse, wireless headset 'amp' with 2.4G low latency connection, and another wired headset. It is plug and play, switches quickly, provides power, the remote is reliable, comes with all the cables you need, which are good quality. Pretty much everything I could ask for. I was also able to stuff a regular CR 2023 battery in the remote (NOT reccomended but possible, it is supposed to use a a smaller size), because I only had 2023s around. Read more

I wanted to switch a single keyboard and mouse between multiple computers, all of which already have their own monitors. This works great, as I no longer have to have multiple keyboards on my desk. There can be a delay of a second or so when switching, but not so much that it is problematic. The thing to emphasize here is the customer service. One of the cables had a defect and would not fully plug in. I sent a quick email describing the situation, and had a replacement cable in my mailbox a few days later. Adding Cable Matters to my list of preferred manufacturers. Read more