XPS 13, USB Type-C hub?

The model I've been looking at is the new XPS 13 inch 2-in-one laptop. 10th Generation i7 processor. 512 SSD and 16gb ram.

And thank you for all the information about what might work for me. I'll check them all out.

Ok yes, from what I know of that system, it's a great choice because it includes the new "Ice Lake" CPUs that should be a significant generational improvement in CPU performance, GPU performance, and battery life, but the fact that it only has two USB-C/TB3 ports and a microSD card reader does create some challenges if you have multiple external peripherals you want to plug in.  Anyhow, any of the options I described above should work for you.  Good luck!

Thanks.

@Sheryl66  that's correct.  Here's how it works: Most hubs like that do not support receiving external power, such as the 5-in-1 adapter I also linked and the Dell DA300.  With those hubs, the USB ports built into them can only provide power based on what they can draw from the USB port on the laptop that the hub itself is plugged into -- except the hub is already using some of that available power from to run itself and any other electronics built into it -- so there's less power available for the built-in USB ports.  The result is that if you have a high-power USB device such as a USB-powered external hard drive, that hard drive might work when plugged directly into the system (where the full power of that port is available just for that device), but might NOT work if you plug it into a USB port on an unpowered hub.  That's especially the case if you also have other USB devices plugged into the other ports, because now you're trying to run multiple USB devices from the power available on a single source port.  That's usually fine for things like flash drives and other devices that draw no power from the USB port (such as printers and wall-powered external hard drives), but not so much with USB-powered external hard drives.

By comparison, a hub that's directly plugged into external power has more power available to provide to its built-in USB ports, so this problem should go away.  So with the 7-in-1 hub, you shouldn't have this problem as long as you have a USB-C power source plugged into its power passthrough port.  That hub by the way will work just fine without that external power source if you ever need to use it that way, but without the benefit of higher-powered USB ports.

However, if you're plugging a separate powered USB 3.0 hub into this Anker hub, then it won't make a difference whether you use the 5-in-1 hub, the 7-in-1 hub without power, or the 7-in-1 hub with power.  The reason is that the separate USB 3.0 hub won't be trying to draw power from the Anker hub, since it will have its own power source, and any devices plugged into that separate USB 3.0 hub will have their power requirements met by that hub, without relying on pulling anything from the Anker hub.

The only thing to be aware of as I mentioned above is using your laptop's actual charger to run through the Anker 7-in-1 hub.  The XPS 13 is designed for a 45W power source, and consequently Dell ships a 45W charger -- but the Anker hub can sometimes pull up to 20W.  So if you use your Dell 45W charger as the power source with that Anker hub, you might end up getting significantly less power through to the XPS 13.  It won't cause any damage, but you might see slower battery charging and sometimes slower performance.  There are two options to deal with this:

- Keep plugging the laptop's charger directly into the laptop and use the Anker hub unpowered, which will be fine as long as you'll be using some other powered USB 3.0 hub as well.  The downside is that you now have both of your laptop's ports in use, so if you ever had a Thunderbolt 3 peripheral you wanted to use (which you would not be able to run through the Anker hub), the only way to have that peripheral, the Anker hub, and your charger simultaneously connected would be to run the charger through the Anker hub and accept reduced power.  Otherwise, you'd only be able to have 2 of those 3 things plugged in at a time.

- Buy a higher wattage USB-C power source, such as a 60W, 65W, or 90W charger.  That way, even if the Anker hub is skimming off its full 20W, there will still be at least 45W of capacity available to pass through to the XPS 13.  You won't damage the system by using a higher wattage power source than it's designed for; the system will simply ignore any additional capacity it doesn't want.  Note that if you want to use a power source over 60W, you'll need USB-C cables rated for up to 100W.  USB-C cables are rated to carry either up to 60W or up to 100W over power, sometimes written as 3A (amps) or 5A, because those amperages at the current standard's maximum 20V work out to 60W and 100W.  If you use a 60W/3A USB-C cable, then you'll only ever get 60W even if the power source can provide more and the device on the other end could use more.

I've been researching all the devices you talked about and just want to be sure I fully understand the choices I'm looking to make.

If I buy the Anker USB  C Hub Adapter, 7-in-1 USB C Adapter I can power my laptop through it and plug another hub with usb 3 ports and not have to worry about how much power I'm using?

@Sheryl66  one other thing I forgot to mention.  If you go with the 7-in-1 Anker hub that has a power passthrough port, be aware of one behavior you might observe that most people find unintuitive and unexpected.  If you switch that hub between powered and unpowered mode, the hub will essentially have to reboot.  As a result, any USB devices connected through that hub, even if they're directly connected to an "upstream" hub, will be briefly disconnected and then reconnected.  This isn't a design deficiency in that particular product, but rather the result of complying with mandatory provisions of the current USB Power Delivery spec, which basically says that if there's a change in the USB PD power source, the device has to perform a new power negotiation with that new power source.  Since the Anker hub doesn't have an internal battery to cover that transition, this renegotiation entails briefly cutting power and therefore essentially rebooting the device.  So whenever you'll be switching between powered and unpowered mode, make sure you're not actively reading or writing data on an external hard drive connected through that hub, for example.  And when you're about to plug the hub into the system, if you plan to use it in powered mode, you should plug the power source into the hub before plugging the hub into your laptop -- although that's just a convenience to save you a reboot, not an essential requirement.

Thanks for the warning. 

I'm still trying to decide what Hub to buy and have another question in regards to the powered adapters. I need this adapter so I can plug my HTMI touchscreen monitor into it so it will constantly be plugged into a wall outlet. Does this mean the battery on the laptop will constantly be charging? If so, I didn't think that was good to do.

Thanks again for all this information.

It depends on the hub/adapter.  Some hubs have power purely to run themselves, but if the adapter specifically says it supports power passthrough to the system, then yes that would be basically equivalent to the system always being plugged into the wall.  I say "basically" because the adapter will likely still be drawing some power for itself, which means there won't be as much power being passed through to the system as there would be if the adapter was connected directly.  And some adapters can only pass through a maximum of 60W.  That's plenty of ran XPS 13 that only uses 45W, but an XPS 15 uses 130W.  Fyi when asking technical questions like this, the more detail you can provide about your proposed setup, the more likely you'll get relevant, reliable answers.

To your larger question about whether it's bad to keep a battery connected to power all the time, it's true that batteries don't like being kept at 100% all the time, but that's still better than deliberately using the system on battery power instead even when you have wall power available.  Those unnecessary additional discharge and recharge cycles impose more wear overall than keeping the battery topped up.  The ideal setup for battery longevity is to go into your BIOS and set the battery's maximum charge level to 80%.  Incidentally, that's exactly how Tesla vehicles work unless you specifically select a "Max Range Charge" to use 100% capacity, but you cannot make that the default mode; you have to request it every time you want it.  And then for even better longevity, configure a MINIMUM charge of 50%.  That way rather than the battery even being kept topped up to 80% all of the time, when it reaches 80%, it will be allowed to "self-discharge" even when it's connected to power.  In this setup, the system is NOT actively discharging the battery to run itself; it's still running from wall power, but it is NOT using any wall power to maintain the battery's charge.  Instead, the system will allow the battery to self-discharge down to 50%, which could literally take weeks if you never use the system on battery power, and only THEN will it charge it back up to 80%.  This mode is ideal for longevity because in this setup, the battery spends the vast majority of its time not receiving or providing any power at all.  The downside of course is that if you have to disconnect from the wall without warning, you might only have a 50% charge available.  However, if you DO have a bit of advance notice and want to charge your battery beforehand, you could open up Dell Power Manager within Windows and tell the system to charge immediately.

I am getting so confused on what I should buy. I've been trying to find adapters that don't have a passthrough but unless I'm searching wrong, I don't seem to be having much luck. If I buy an adapter with a passthrough, do I have to use it? From the pictures of adapters it looks as if it connects to the laptop with a plug attached to the adapter. Does that have anything to do with how the laptop gets charged?

I'm thinking of getting this Anker adapter. https://www.amazon.com/Anker-Upgraded-Adapter-Delivery-Pixelbook/dp/B07ZVKTP53/ref=dp_ob_title_def

It says it has a passthrough but I'd prefer not to use it. 

And if I go with this adapter, it doesn't have many usb ports so I'd like to plug a usb adapter into it. Would that work?

I think I finally found what looks to be the best adapter for my needs. https://www.amazon.com/Upgraded-Ethernet-High-Speed-MacBook-Pro/dp/B07PVKHZLJ/ref=pd_sbs_147_t_0/137-0248919-7834316?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=B07PVKHZLJ&pd_rd_r=dea13ae5-e4ca-4c64-a186-8a4db37da29d&pd_rd_w=25SEW&pd_rd_wg=O5pWk&pf_rd_p=5cfcfe89-300f-47d2-b1ad-a4e27203a02a&pf_rd_r=PTQ10WYHKASPB7H2FYHT&psc=1&refRID=PTQ10WYHKASPB7H2FYHT 

This has 4 usb 3 ports and all the other ports I need to run my touchscreen monitor.

@Sheryl66  I can't say I've ever heard of that manufacturer, but looking purely at the specs, if cost and portability aren't a concern, then it does seem to have an impressive array of ports.  That said, if I wasn't concerned about portability, I personally would buy a proper docking station that has its own power source (for a reason I'll mention below), like the Dell WD19 or WD19TB.  I realize that wouldn't have the SD card reader built in, but SD card readers that plug into USB ports are easy to find and not expensive -- and as the SD card standard continues to evolve, you might need a newer reader than the one integrated into this product anyway.  A docking station would also support dual displays, which this product seems not to, and it would come with a power source, which would keep your current one free for use elsewhere, such as dedicated to your laptop bag or permanently parked in another area of the house where you might use your laptop often.

But if you're set on that product, be aware of a few things:

- It seems this product doesn't support running dual independent displays.  The only video outputs that can be used simultaneously are HDMI and VGA, but even there the specs note that they can only be used in mirror mode, not extend mode.  And apparently when DisplayPort is in use, HDMI and VGA are both disabled.

- The "HDMI 4K" port description is technically true but a bit misleading because it would only be 4K only at 30 Hz, not the 60 Hz common for PC displays.  That's a limitation of using regular USB-C (as opposed to Thunderbolt) with this particular system.  As of this writing, there are very few systems on the market that can run 4K 60 Hz over a regular USB-C connection that is running a docking station and when the USB-C connection needs to carry both video data and USB 3.x data.

- Since it seems this product draws power from whatever USB-C power source you attached to it, I would be concerned about how much power a product with this many ports will skim off for itself before passing anything through to your laptop.  I also find it disappointing that this product doesn't even identify its own power draw or even call this issue out in order to help purchasers plan accordingly, rather than simply trying to use their laptop's normal AC adapter through this and then ending up with a slow-performing laptop because the laptop is no longer getting the amount of power it's designed to be getting.  So if you get something like this, you might want a 90W USB-C power source, like this one that I happen to own.  Hopefully this product doesn't consume more than 45W, in which case there would still be 45W available to pass through to your system, which is what it's designed to have.