14-05-2021

Docking Station For Mac

Your Mac comes with a small panel along the edge of the screen called the Dock: It lets you quickly access your favorite apps, files, and folders, as well as any actively-running apps. When you save an item to the Dock, you can access it at any time by clicking on it.

By default, most of Apple's built-in apps start with shortcuts saved in the Dock, but you can also remove those shortcuts and add your own. You can also customize the Dock to fit your preferences. Here's how.

Docking station for Mac & PC? By kayjay1111 March 6, 2019 9:33 AM PST. I currently have a 15 inch 2016 Macbook Pro for my personal use. I also have a Dell Latitude 5490 as my work laptop.

What is the Dock, and what gets displayed there?

The Dock has been with the Mac for over a decade, now: It offers you a quick way to access the Finder (your Mac's underlying filesystem) as well as your currently running applications, favorite apps, favorite files or folders, and the Trash.

When you first set up your Mac, your Dock lives along the bottom of your screen in a translucent rectangle; if you don't like its positioning, you can move it to the left or right of the screen, or have it automatically hide whenever you're not interacting with it. Items are organized as follows, left to right:

  • The Finder
  • Favorite app shortcuts
  • Currently-running apps (you can also choose in the Dock preferences whether you want to view an indicator (a little black dot) for currently-open apps)
  • Favorite files or folders
  • The Trash

Though you can shuffle the position of app shortcuts in the Dock, you can't move the Finder or Trash — they live on opposite ends of the Dock, respectively — nor can you mix file shortcuts with apps in the same section.

How to add apps to the Dock on your Mac

  1. Launch a Finder window from your Dock.

  2. Click on Applications in the sidebar.

  3. Select an app and drag it to the Dock.

  4. Let go of the app while it hovers over the Dock.

If you want to permanently add a currently-running app to your Dock:

  1. Right-click or Control-click on the app icon in the Dock.
  2. Select Options under the drop-down menu.
  3. Click on Keep in Dock.

You can alternatively just drag the icon to a different position in your Dock, which will automatically save it as a favorite shortcut.

How to add files and folders to the Dock on your Mac

Files and folders can also be saved to your Dock, but they can only be stored on the far right of the Dock, after your app shortcuts. The Dock has a demarcating line that separates apps from files and folders, so you won't mix them up.

  1. Launch a Finder window from your Dock.
  2. Select a file or folder from its location on your Mac and drag it to the right side of the Dock.
  3. Let go of the file or folder while it hovers over the right side of the Dock.

How to remove apps, files, and folders from the Dock on your Mac

If you don't want a particular app, file or folder in your Dock anymore, you can remove it with just one gesture. Note that this doesn't remove the item from your computer, it just removes the shortcut from the Dock; you can always re-add the app or folder by following the steps above.

  1. Select an app, file, or folder and drag it out of the Dock.

    When it is hovering over your desktop, you will see the word Remove appear above the app, file, or folder.

  2. Let go of the app, file, or folder. It will disappear from the Dock.

  3. Repeat the steps above to remove all items you no longer want to kept in the Dock.

Note: If you do this on a currently-open app, it will continue to stay in the Dock until you Quit the application, at which point it will disappear.

How to organize the Dock on your Mac

You can rearrange the placement of apps, files, and folders in your Dock so they are in alphabetical order, color-coordinated, or however you like.

Note: You can't move the Finder or Trash icons to the far left and right of the Dock respectively. They are anchored to the Dock because of their importance to the system.

  1. Select an app, file, or folder in the Dock.
  2. Drag it to a new location in the Dock.

  3. Let go of the app, file, or folder while it hovers over the new location in the Dock.

How to change the Dock's size on your Mac

You can adjust the size of the dock so that icons are larger or smaller on your screen.

  1. Click on the Apple icon in the upper left corner of your Mac's screen.

  2. Select System Preferences from the drop down menu.

  3. Click on Dock.

  4. Drag the Size slider to the left or right to increase or decrease the size of the Dock.

  5. Tick the box for Magnification to enable an animation that makes the items in the Dock that your cursor hovers over larger.

  6. Drag the Magnification slider to the left or right to increase or decrease how large the icons grow when your cursor hovers over them.

Universal Docking Station For Mac And Pc

How to change the Dock's orientation on your Mac

You can display the Dock on the bottom, right, or left side of your screen.

  1. Click on the Apple icon in the upper left corner of your Mac's screen.

  2. Select System Preferences from the drop down menu.

  3. Click on Dock.

  4. Select Left, Bottom, or Right to change the orientation of the Dock.

How to automatically hide or show the Dock on your Mac

On smaller laptop screens, every bit of screen space is valuable. If you don't want the Dock getting in the way of your productivity, you can keep it hidden until you want to access it, at which point, you can call it back up by hovering your cursor over the place where it normally resides.

  1. Click on the Apple icon in the upper left corner of your Mac's screen.

  2. Select System Preferences from the drop down menu.

  3. Click on Dock.

  4. Tick the box for Automatically hide and show the Dock.

How to hide recent applications on the Dock on macOS Mojave

Much like iOS on the iPad, macOS Mojave puts users' recently-used applications in a special section of the Dock. If this doesn't sound like your cup of tea, it's easy enough to turn off.

  1. Open System Preferences from your Dock or Applications folder.

  2. Click Dock.

  3. Click the checkbox next to Show recent applications in Dock so that the check disappears (it's on by default).

Docking

You can check the box if you decide you want to use this feature.

Bonus: Pro tips for using the Dock

  • You can change the size of the Dock by positioning the cursor over the Dock divider that separates apps from files and folders. The cursor will change to a double-sided arrow; click and drag to increase or decrease the size of the Dock.

  • You can change the location of the Dock by holding down the shift key, clicking on that divider, and dragging the Dock to the left, bottom, or right sides of the screen.

  • If you'd like to keep an app that's open in the Dock permanently, right or control-click the icon in the Dock, select Options and select Keep in Dock.

  • If you want to add spacers between apps, there's a Terminal command to do so.

macOS Catalina

Main

Docking Station For Mac

Set-top of the pile

Survey suggests nearly a quarter of U.S. Apple customers own an Apple TV

Research conducted by Consumer Intelligence Research Partners has revealed that almost 25% of US Apple Customers own an Apple TV.

This blog focuses on the installation, types, uses, and pros and cons of a USB storage hard drive docking station.

A USB hard drive or SSD docking station is an electronic device for reading, writing, cloning and recovering data from multiple storage drives via multiple bays, simultaneously. It acts as an alternative for SATA/IDE to USB cable or drives enclosure for performing the data transfer & data recovery job to a Mac, but with added benefits. Before we delve into the categories, usages, and merits of a docking station, let us know how to install a docking device.

  1. Connect the docking station to your iMac or MacBook via a USB cable
  2. Connect the power cable to the docking station and turn on the power supply
  3. Insert the internal storage drive to its slot aligning the connectors to the SATA interface
  4. Switch on the docking station by using the power button
  5. Let your Mac detect and install the device automatically, without the need for a driver
  6. The docking station is now ready for data transfer, once the installation is complete

Types & Uses of USB Drive Docking Station

There are single bay, two-bay, and multiple-bay docking stations. A single bay docking station is useful if you have a defunct MacBook Pro or iMac, and you need to retrieve the data present in Macintosh HD. First, take out the drive from the inactive Mac and use a single bay USB docking station to access its data on a working Mac computer. Copy the data from the drive to the Mac manually or try to image the drive with the help of Disk Utility.

For a two-bay docking station with in-built cloning facility, you do not need to connect the device to your Mac; you can do the task offline. Just turn on the docking station, insert the source drive and the target drive, and press the copy button. The docking station will create an exact replica of the source drive to the target drive.

The multiple-bay docking station is useful for IT technician who needs to copy the data from many drives without performing the monotonous task by the piece, thereby saving precious time and energy. In addition, multiple-bay docking station that supports RAID recovery is quite an advantage for corporate users.

Pros of USB Docking Station

  • Access 2.5” or 3.5” SATA HDD or SSD to copy, transfer, or backup data
  • Plug and play without the need of a driver
  • Provides fast data transfer rate
  • Clone a storage drive offline
  • Some docking station supports RAID mode (RAID 0/1)

Cons of USB Docking Station

  • Pricier than SATA/IDE to USB cable and disk enclosure
  • More usage of power
  • Requires cable management
  • Connector damage issue
  • Non-horizontal mount orientation of drive may affect its lifespan

Before you discard or upgrade an old storage drive, you should transfer the data and completely erase the drive to prevent undesired data exposure. In case, after connecting the storage drive to the docking station on a computer, the drive is inaccessible through the Finder but is visible via the Disk Utility, then you can use Stellar Data Recovery Professionalfor Mac to recover the inaccessible data.

Best Docking Station For Macbook Pro

Watch the video for more information.

Conclusion

Docking Station For Macbook Pro 13 Inch

This blog answered an important question, is docking station helpful for Mac drive recovery? The answer is Yes. You can use a docking station to access the internal Mac storage drive. Perform data recovery in case the drive has data loss issue. Use a data recovery software such as Stellar Data Recovery Professional to recover the lost data. Stellar Data Recovery Technician is best suited to meet the requirements of IT Technicians and AMC or Corporate users to recover data from multiple Mac computers.