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Comment by ppseafield | Hacker News Reader

I have a NexDock 360, which I have primarily used with a Samsung S21 but also with a PinePhone.

The NexDock 360 is an OK device. The battery life lasted me about 2-3 hours, which isn't long enough for me. On Android with DeX there is no palm rejection, so I ended up keeping the touchpad switched off most of the time. PureOS might handle this better. The screen has touch input, but it's a pretty poor display - colors are washed out, and it isn't terribly bright.

It was nice to be able to take notes without carrying around a full laptop, and I think with a better screen and battery life it would be much more useful for traveling. It has a mini HDMI port, and I did use it as a third monitor for my laptop for a bit, but I eventually just got another desktop monitor with a better screen.

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> On Android with DeX there is no palm rejection, so I ended up keeping the touchpad switched off most of the time.

This has been my experience on Linux as well with my NexDock Touch. As best I can tell the touchpad is only presented to the OS as a mouse, so it can't do palm rejection in software (and you'll never get those fancy multitouch gestures in e.g. GNOME).

The only lapdock I've ever used that did this right is the HP Elite X3's lapdock. It's thus my favorite of the ones that exist, but it can't seem to supply enough power over USB-C to charge a lot of devices during use including the Librem 5. Still holding out for one with both the touchpad (and keyboard) quality of the HP lapdock and the power output of the NexDock. (I suspect I'll be waiting a while though, it's a very niche product.)

I didn't know something like this existed, thanks for a thorough review

I want something like this for reading PDFs (in tablet mode) and possibly coding from my phone, that I can carry around in my backpack when I'd rather not bring my whole laptop too.

I found reading on this screen to be pretty mediocre, and it is quite large to be held like a tablet (but possible, if awkward).

If you would like to code on your phone, you would most likely need something browser based, or something running Linux like the Librem 5 here. It's not as easy to set up a decent development environment using Android.

Ah I hadn't considered it would be too large to be held like that, thanks for the heads up

Indeed, it is 13" and not as skinny as a tablet.

I use a Moto Edge+ (2022) phone that has a feature that allows you to use it as a RDP-like session in Windows. It's called "Ready for PC" and works like any other RDP type session. Copy/paste works, and you can drag & drop files to the desktop.

You can also pair the phone to a display (USB-C or USB-C-to-HDMI). With a BT keyboard and mouse, it works like a desktop. You can also use the phone screen as as a trackpad. I beleive this is pretty similar to DeX as you describe.

Additionally, it'll connect via BT to a Smart TV to be used as well.

There's a couple more modes such as mirroring the Android display, or keeping it to a particular app. You can also use the phone as a Webcam under Windows, but it's a bit laggy.

It kinda seems like a 13 inch tablet with a mouse and keyboard would give you a better experience, better battery life, better screen, be lighter, and so on.

This thing looks just as heavy as a really cheap 13 inch laptop, except that it's missing most of the important parts and you must supply those by connecting a phone.

So, am I missing something? What's the point of this? Assuming it had a better screen and good battery life, would it be useful?

It's pretty niche, but as a Linux phone user I can see the appeal: with a device like this I can totally get rid of a standalone laptop.

For situations where you can easily connect 3 peripherals to create a desktop experience, indeed, this is inferior. But it's exactly the in-between situations - sitting on the couch but want to be slightly more productive than using an on-screen keyboard - that I think something like this would shine. But again, admittedly, niche.

Right now I use a separate, old Linux laptop and SSH to my Linux phone to emulate the above, but that feels wrong somehow, and requires me to keep multiple devices in sync, connected to WiFi or Tailscale, etc.

It's true it's a bit of a novelty. If I had a laptop in the niche you described, it would cover some of the use cases I used it on.

It is much smaller and lighter than my laptop, which also has horrible battery life in Linux. It didn't cost as much as that laptop either.

I was able to use it for

1. A quick screen/keyboard for a raspberry pi, the PinePhone I mentioned, and a Mac mini,

2. Taking notes during TTRPG sessions while having my app-only (at the time) character builder on the same screen,

3. One-off tasks on my phone suited to a larger screen and keyboard (e.g. responding to an email chain that started to need a longer explanations without having to log in to another computer),

4. Browsing and looking things up on the couch, and

5. Third monitor for my laptop at my desk, and a second monitor for my laptop while traveling.

It was nice to not have to log into something else or transfer files back and forth between my phone and another computer. It also has a headphone jack, which my phone did not. So there were several small niches where it worked OK, none where it excelled.

Isn't the battery life going to be much less than those phones with a Librem 5?

I can't speak to the battery life of the Librem 5. You can choose to charge the phone or not charge the phone through the NextDock 360 pop-up menu, which can help it last a little longer.

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