In the modern digital office and fast-paced work environment, multi-screens can handle complex multi-tasks at the same time and enhance work efficiency, thus multi-screen office has become the standard in many industries. As laptops are in pursuit of extreme thinness and lightness, and thus have no more room for various ports such as HDMI and DP, many laptops are manufactured with only one HDMI port and one or two USB-C ports or only two or three USB-C ports. The lack of laptop ports contradicts the need for multiple screens, for example, when using a laptop for office work, a screen is needed to provide a video feed when conducting a meeting, a screen to share the screen for presentations, and a screen to take notes or view meeting related materials.The TESmart HDC203-P24 utilises MST technology to provide users with an efficient and flexible way to manage multiple displays.
MST, or Multi-Stream Transfer Technology, was first introduced in the DP 1.2 standard, allowing multiple displays to be connected to a single DP port or USB-C port on a desktop or laptop computer. Unlike SST, which only supports the transmission of a single video stream to one monitor, MST allows a single video signal to be split into multiple streams that can be displayed independently on multiple monitors, each showing a portion of the content independently, thus enabling the use of multiple screens for extended display.
MST can be implemented through daisy chaining and MST Hub (KVM switch). Daisy chaining requires a monitor with a DP 1.2 (or higher) port and an MST-enabled DP output port to be connected in a daisy chain fashion, i.e., connect the computer to monitor A, then connect monitor A to monitor B, and so on. MST Hub implementation only requires connecting the computer to the input port of the MST Hub and the monitor to the output port of the MST Hub. It should be noted that the Windows operating system supports MST. macOS does not support MST, only SST, so when connected to the MST Hub, extended display of the monitor cannot be realized, only copy display is possible.
The TESmart HDC203-P24 supports access to two computers and three monitors, with two sets of input ports being HDMI+DP+DP and USB-C (MST), convenient for desktop and laptop access. Especially, the USB-C port of the HDC203-P24 has the MST function, allowing laptops (Windows) to achieve three-screen display with just a single USB-C cable connection. This setup allows for on-demand extended or copy display, not only optimizing wiring but also enabling the use of three screens simultaneously for multitasking, such as viewing emails while preparing documents or using multiple screens for data viewing and analysis during data analysis. Additionally, the USB-C port can provide 60W of charging power to charge the connected laptop. The HDC203-P24 is also equipped with four (3*USB-A, 1*USB-C) USB 3.2 Gen1 ports, which can be used to access USB peripherals such as flash drives and cameras. With two dedicated ports for keyboard and mouse access, it supports Pass Through mode and Legacy Emulation Mode to enhance the compatibility of the keyboard and mouse, and it also supports custom hotkeys, which can use any key on the keyboard connected to the KVM as the trigger key for hotkey commands. Furthermore, the HDC203-P24 supports Gigabit networking, simplifying network wiring by allowing two computers to connect to the network with just one cable.
