I'm now researching the same things as in this thread, and I'm coming away more confused than when I started.

Here's what I understand so far, someone correct me if I'm wrong:

- If you have a laptop with USB3, then your option for a docking station is one with DisplayLink drivers.

- If you have a laptop with Thunderbolt ports using a USBC cable, then you could use a DisplayLink docking station like above, or, to be even more fancy, you could get a Thunderbolt docking station and then the displays could go straight from the plug to the monitors, without having to go through the DisplayLink driver.

- Nobody makes docks with both. It's either one or the other.

Am I right about the above?

Here's what I have, and what I want to do...

- I've got two 1920x1080 HDMI/DVI monitors I'm using right now. I might upgrade them someday.

- I've got a USB3 Windows 8.1 laptop.

- I've got a USB3 DisplayLink dock, which drives two displays (albeit limited to 1920x1080 or very close to it, and I occasionally see mild data compression artifacts from DisplayLink on them).

- On its way to me via UPS is a new Macbook Pro, arriving in a few days (I finally pulled the trigger and I'm swiching to Mac for audio production while I'm between album projects).

- I want a dock that allows me to plug either the Macbook or the Windows 8.1 laptop into it (at different times, not at the same time) and will use both monitors, the existing mouse/keyboard, and whatever USB peripherals are plugged into the dock.


I have already verified that my existing setup (USB3 DisplayLink dock with two HDMI/DVI monitors) works fine in the way that I want. I have plugged friends' macs into it and, as long as we install the DisplayLink drivers onto the mac, it works. I can freely switch between the Windows box and the Mac box by merely unplugging one and plugging in the other. So I've got something that will work for now.

But if I ever want to upgrade my displays to something higher than 1920x1080, or if I ever want to take advantage of the Thunderbolt connection on the Mac to drive the displays directly, I'll need to upgrade the dock. The problem is that, I think, from my research so far, if I do that, then the Windows 8.1 laptop will no longer be able to use the displays on the new dock. Am I correct about that?

Is there any solution that will work with both kinds of devices?