A few weeks ago at IDF, Displaylink released drivers for USB monitors on Linux. This has been something SemiAccurate has been asking them about since, well it has been years now.
The idea is simple, transfer video data over USB rather than a dedicated video port. This requires a bit of compression, CPU load, and of course their proprietary hardware on the monitor side. That isn’t a big deal, the chips are fairly inexpensive and since you are buying a USB monitor or dock, it comes with the device out of the box. On the plus side it means your monitor will work everywhere, or at least it will now.
It is finally here and real
As you can see above the Displaylink hardware, that would be the two monitors above, are running off a Ubuntu 14.04.2 notebook. This means the supported OS list now includes Windows 7+, Android Lollipop, OSX Chrome,, and now Linux. That is a pretty complete set of offerings and all we can say is well done.
So if you want 4K from your non-4K laptop, tablet, or phone, you know where to look. If you want dual 4K from said devices, you are not out of luck either. The best part is not you are not hamstrung by OS choice, multiple 4K screens for all on all is finally here. Now I just have to think up what to whine about for the next three years.S|A
Charlie Demerjian
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