Frustration follows me, everywhere, I think. I have a nice Dell USB-C dock, connected to an Apple MacBook Air.

Problem is the frequent electronic disconnect of items attached to the dock. Just now, the USB speakers had to be removed and reinserted into the dock. Now they show up as an output option for sound. The display often is dark, and has to be removed and reconnected.

Or, I have to remove power from the dock, then reinsert the cable.

Why in the world can't it just stay like it was when I left the house this morning?

USB seems to be susceptible to small fluctuations in wall power, not to mention that the wall-warts that power typical hubs can be flaky themselves. Try replacing you wall-wart with a higher-rated unit, and/or plug the dock into a UPS with surge protection.

If it is the MacBook that is supplying power to the dock (e.g. through the USB connection), make sure it isn't going to sleep or some other power-saving mode while you are away.

Let me know when you figure it out. If a mouse farts in Africa mine drops all three monitors then returns 30 seconds later. Been like that since the day I set it up.

I had some issues like that. I updated drivers and FW for everything I could find (related to the dock) on both the PC side and the dock side.

For example, if there was a FW or driver update for USBc HW on the PC side, I would install it. If I found a FW update for the HW in the dock side, I would update it.

Took awhile because laptop side and dock side (Apple and Dell in your case) need to be aware of a problem (as reported by users), debug, fix and publish the updates.

You would think "industry standard" HW would just work.

Sometimes, OS updates would break things again (ie - when updating from W10 to W11).

I get intermittent screen drops, just for a second or two. My boss was getting them too, a firmware update solved his, but not mine.

Mine is a WD23, his is a WD19

I also run 3 displays, 2 25" S2522HG & 1 24" P2417H

I seem to be the only one with display issues, and my only suspicion is that it's tied to my display setup.

We also get occasional complaints that a user's dock is inop. Usually after some sort of power blip/drop. The WD docks seem to have some sort of internal breaker that trips. Have to pull power for a few seconds & reconnect, usually brings it back.

No experience with using a Dell dock on anything but Dell machine, though, so can't speak to your direct situation.

If it were a Windows machine ~ I would say to look at your power app.
Maybe Apple has something similar.

Sounds like power management settings to me, have you looked at any of those?

The dock is externally powered with 180 w dell power supply.

I will check Apple power settings for sleep.

I cannot update dock firmware without a windows machine.

quote:

Originally posted by P250UA5:
I get intermittent screen drops, just for a second or two. My boss was getting them too, a firmware update solved his, but not mine.

Mine is a WD23, his is a WD19

I also run 3 displays, 2 25" S2522HG & 1 24" P2417H

I have two Dell docks, one at work and one at home. I lose video from time to time. It comes back after a few seconds.

I use three monitors at work. My setup was very unstable until our IT support person plugged one of the monitors directly into my laptop with an HDMI cable. That solved a lot of the problems I was having.

It seems the dock couldn't handle three monitors.

For a Macbook I recommend ditching the Dell dock and move to this or similar model from CalDigit. I have one in each of two office locations, it's a one-cable connection to MacBook Air and previously MacBook, and has been 100% stable. Connected to external wide monitor, power supply, Time Machine, several charging cables for phone, etc.

CalDigit dock

That linked model is what I purchased 4 years ago, they may have updated options. My IT wizard recommended this, and it has been perfect.

I can see how three monitors might be a challenge, maybe consider an extra wide for one of those plus a normal one? WAG here....