Alongside Qi2 wireless charging stands, Apple accessory maker Satechi this week unveiled new hubs and charger options for Apple's Mac lineup.
The upgraded Stand & Hub for Mac mini and Mac Studio fits under one of Apple's slim desktop machines, and it includes an NVMe SSD enclosure that supports NVMe and M.2 SATA SSDs. There are USB-C 3.1 and USB-A 3.1 ports for file transfers, with support for speeds up to 10Gb/s.
An SSD added into the hub can be used for Time Machine backups, plus there are also two additional USB-A 3.0 ports, micro/SD card readers, and an audio jack for headphones.
Satechi's Thunderbolt 4 Slim Hub Pro has three Thunderbolt 4 downstream ports that support data transfers at up to 40GB/s, plus it can deliver up to 15W of power to connected peripherals. It supports up to two 4K displays or one 8K display, and it offers 32Gb/s native PCIe support for external GPUs and Thunderbolt-based SSDs.
The 145W USB-C 4-Port GaN Travel Charger has two USB-C 3.1 ports that can provide up to 140W and two USB-C 3.0 ports that can provide up to 45W. The 145W max power is split between devices when more than one device is plugged in, with the charger providing smart power distribution that automatically adjusts wattage for optimal charging.
Monday November 17, 2025 3:20 pm PST by Juli Clover
Apple provided developers with the third beta of an upcoming iOS 26.2 update, and there are still new features that are being added with each beta that we get. We've rounded up all of the changes that Apple made in beta 3.
AirDrop
Apple added new AirDrop functionality, providing a way for two people to share files temporarily without having to add one another as contacts.
iOS 26.2...
Apple today announced an expansion of AppleCare+ coverage in India, with new options for monthly and annual plans, and the addition of Theft and Loss for iPhone for the first time.
Options for monthly and annual AppleCare+ plans in India provide more choice and flexibility, allowing users to keep coverage for as long as they require. Apple's vice president of Worldwide iPhone Product...
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Apple's iPhone development roadmap runs several years into the future and the company is continually working with suppliers on several successive iPhone models at the same time, which is why we often get rumored features months ahead of launch. The iPhone 18 series is no different, and we already have a good idea of what to expect for the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max.
One thing worth...
Thursday November 20, 2025 6:28 am PST by Joe Rossignol
Apple's annual four-day Black Friday through Cyber Monday shopping event is returning on Friday, November 28 through Monday, December 1 in many countries, including the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the United Kingdom, Belgium, the Netherlands, Sweden, Thailand, and others.
During the shopping event, customers can get an Apple gift card with...
Tuesday November 18, 2025 8:47 am PST by Joe Rossignol
In select U.S. states, residents can add their driver's license or state ID to the Wallet app on the iPhone and Apple Watch, providing a convenient and contactless way to display proof of identity or age at select airports and businesses, and in select apps.
Starting this Wednesday, November 19, the feature will be available to residents of Illinois.
The announcement confirmed that the...
Apple's eighth-generation iPad mini is highly likely to arrive next year, offering a significant refresh of the device with at least four major new features.
OLED Display
The next-generation version of the iPad mini could feature an OLED display, as part of Apple's plan to expand the display technology across many more of its devices. Apple's first OLED device was the Apple Watch in 2015, ...
Tuesday November 18, 2025 10:53 am PST by Joe Rossignol
A new study has revealed that the iPhone 17, iPhone 17 Pro, iPhone 17 Pro Max, and iPhone Air achieve significantly faster average Wi-Fi speeds compared to the iPhone 16 series, thanks to Apple's custom-designed N1 chip.
The study was conducted by Ookla, the company behind the popular Speedtest website and app. It said the results are based on global, crowdsourced Speedtest user data...
We're getting closer to Black Friday, which lands next week on Friday, November 28. In the lead-up to the shopping holiday, we're tracking a few lowest-ever prices on Apple's most popular Macs, including the M4 MacBook Air and brand new M5 MacBook Pro.
Note: MacRumors is an affiliate partner with some of these vendors. When you click a link and make a purchase, we may receive a small payment,...
We're officially in the month of Black Friday, which will take place on Friday, November 28 in 2025. As always, this will be the best time of the year to shop for great deals, including popular Apple products like AirPods, iPad, Apple Watch, and more. In this article, the majority of the discounts will be found on Amazon.
Note: MacRumors is an affiliate partner with some of these vendors. When ...
Tuesday November 18, 2025 1:05 pm PST by Juli Clover
Apple today released updated firmware for several accessories, including the 140W USB-C Power Adapter, the Magic Trackpad 2, the Magic Trackpad USB-C, the Magic Keyboard with Touch ID, and the Magic Keyboard with Touch ID and Numeric Keypad.
There is no word on what's included in the updated firmware at this time, but it could offer performance improvements and security updates. Accessory...
Ok now... this is a very compelling for those who don't want to pay the Apple premium for upgraded storage. You can get 4TB of excellent speed for 1/5th of Apple's price now.
Why is the stand & hub not Thunderbolt? What's the first thing you want to add to your new mac mini or studio? Well, a studio display, but the *second* thing is fast storage at less than apple's abusive prices, and wouldn't it be nice if it wasn't dangling out of the back in an untidy mess. Like, why would you have an nvme enclosure and cap it at 10GB/s?
In looking at reviews for the previous mini hub, it seemed like people had problems with the hub just not turning on. Anyone here dealt with that? I’m interested in buying one, but want it to work correctly most of the time.
I have the current hub on my Studio M2 and both the SSD and attached USB keys drop off the bus on a regular basis. Pretty annoying, especially since I was using the SSD for media storage during editing. If I knew the issues had been fixed on this version I’d get one to replace it.
Ok now... this is a very compelling for those who don't want to pay the Apple premium for upgraded storage. You can get 4TB of excellent speed for 1/5th of Apple's price now.
That would be better, but would probably double the price - there are stackable thunderbolt options available, eg: (I don't have one, so not a personal recommendation):
https://www.owc.com/solutions/ministack-stx
Thing is, although TB can be much faster in some situations, not every use-case will actually take advantage of that.
Like, why would you have an nvme enclosure and cap it at 10GB/s?
(That would be 10Gb/s - small 'b' or 1.25 GB/s)
Because many people are happy with a cheap, relatively slow (by modern standards) SSD for backup, media library or document storage, and even if you ignore the speed, NVMe is taking over from SATA and offering more bytes-per-buck.
Anyway, most general workloads don't get close to the "peak sustained transfer speed" - and if you're looking to stream raw high-def video or are constantly copying multi-gigabyte datasets then this is not the product for you (and you probably should have got a M2 Pro or a Mac Studio with more TB ports). Even the slowest SSD is night and day c.f. the good old spinning rust hard drives that people are upgrading from.
I think the main "gotcha" with this is not the 10 Gb/s cap on the drive itself, but that everything connected to this hub is sharing the same 5-10Gbps USB 3 stream so if the drive is in constant use and you hang high-bandwidth USB peripherals off it you'll probably see a performance drop. If that's a problem for you then you need an all-thunderbolt solution. Many people won't notice.
That's the problem that Thunderbolt/USB 4 faces - USB 3.1 is "good enough" for the majority of users, so there isn't the critical mass of sales needed to bring down Thunderbolt prices.
The support of NVMe is awesome, but why don't we get extra USB-C ports?! Yes, I know there is one, but we use one to connect it, so there is no gain. Three USB-A ports? I honestly can't recall the last device I bought that uses that and as this is "new", I am very surprised. And I agree with others, for a new product the lack of Thunderbolt is also surprising.
People suggesting "it's a slow 10Gps" (see above, but their website actually states: "Our Stand and Hub for Mac Mini/Studio with NVMe Enclosure also supports M.2 SATA drives across sizes 2242/2260/2280. With transfer speeds of up to 6Gbps, this setup facilitates storage expansion, system upgrades, file backups, data retrieval, and seamless data transfers. It's a plug-and-play solution requiring no additional drivers."
This has just been released and I am already looking forward to the next version so it can get with the current times.
