I just need to swap the USB-C connector between the three and I get the same displays and peripherals.

Doing this with a "healthy array of external ports" would be a huge pain in the ass.

That might not be a full-time goal. Some want a machine that works on the move but can be expanded to bigger screens and such when at certain locations (office and/or home). A laptop and dock allow this compromise.

It is a compromise, not one suitable for all. But it is the list inconvenient option for many.

I wouldn't say "some". Probably 90% of developers I know require exactly this, in fact off the top of my head I can't think of any who don't. Even the permanent, full-remote, no-really-there-is-literally-no-office types want to sit in a different room sometimes or work from a coffee shop.

It's pretty rare to have a "workstation" setup that cannot be moved.

'... where we came in. Having to buy an external dock is such a compromise! I want to have all the ports on my laptop!'

'But if all your peripherals are connected directly, you need to connect and disconnect them every time, so you have to compromise on mobility. Isn't this...'

And different variations on this same spiral.

And good luck getting anything close to RTX 3090Ti performance in a laptop. It'd basically be a toasted oven on your lap.

Desktops can just sink a ton more heat, and as process shrinks and die size increases have gotten us less and less additional performance each year, we're just pushing power up to the point now where a TOTL gaming desktop is pulling close to 1KW. A laptop will never come close. If you really do want to try a literal desktop CPU in a laptop, there are mfgs like Eurocom and Sager that will sell you one, just don't expect it not to throttle a lot under actual heavy workloads.

Wait, what? Are you like cryptomining or something? That's actually insane. I charge two electric cars at home, work from home using a powerful workstation, and my electricity is about £100/month. How do you manage to spend 800 euro a month????

I find it surprising that the appeal of the above would be confusing for anyone.

Sure, you could buy a separate desktop for that, but if you also go portable, don't want to bother with some kind of online sync solution, and want to move between laptop mode for on the go and something docked to big monitors and a no laptop keyboard/mouse for when you are at your primary workspace, getting a good laptop plus a dock rather than spending more for a laptop plus a separate desktop which makes you have to compromise on syncing somehow makes a lot of sense.

(Obviously, if you need desktop processing power, thermal envelopes mean that laptops aren't going to be competitive. But if that's your need, you aren't going to be looking at laptops, and how to connect peripherals isn't going to be your limiting factor.)

The only things that move around are my laptop and I. I don't want to carry around a desktop computer and plug in power, screens, and USB hub every time I switch desks.

USB remains, of course, a donkey circus. Everyone involved in USB ought to be ashamed of themselves.

So it might be lunacy for you but it's not necessarily lunacy for others. And given the amount of market research these guys do I suspect the "never plug anything else in" crowd is pretty significant.

I don’t use external monitors with that device which probably makes a difference but IMO the point still stands - I think there is a silent majority of people who don’t want or care about more ports.

Flash drive? Hardly ever used one; networking existed before they were invented.

I'm using a BT mouse explicitly not to bother with a stupid "2.4GHz USB Receiver" and keep one (USB-A!) port free.

but I can comment on what a polygot cross-platform cross-cloud software engineer who supports a plethora of native portable devices integrations require, and thats USB hubs with ports coming out the ye-ha - otherwise im constantly playing musical chairs.

But why did you have to begin your comment with the condescending “all the sheep/ad devs”? It makes you look insecure and I only read beyond that because your comment was so brief.

There are machines with lots of ports and machines with few and someone’s choice of which to use is not a moral judgement.

It's a nice way to avoid the lunacy here.

One for USB-C to Ethernet adapter.

One for Apple adapter that I plug USB-C power into, plus HDMI, plus a mouse.

Always works. Though it can’t prevent me forgetting to plug the Ethernet adapter in and realising I’ve been on wifi all day.

Sure this is relatively new and a ton of hubs are shit but this will only become better.

I can use my Anker mini dock on my laptop, switch and Samsung s22.