Having recently started working from home, I needed some way of sharing my two new monitors (Dell U2415) between my existing desktop PC and the docking station (Dell E-Port Plus Port Replicator) of my work laptop (both computers running Windows 10). Both the desktop and the docking station have dual DVI connectors so I needed a KVM that could handle DVI. After initially finding a suitable switch and discovering that it was only available in the USA (doh!) I came across the Aten CS1642a. There didn't seem to be a lot of reviews of this unit but the ones I could find seemed to suggest it was a good piece of kit that would do the job, so I took the plunge.
Well, I have just received and installed it and I can confirm that it is brilliant! I plugged everything in and it just....worked! No faffing around, no hassle, no twiddling required. Switching between systems takes ~2 seconds and is entirely painless.
It also comes with all the necessary cables to connect to two machines; this incorporates 4 separate cables:
- 2 x DVI/USB/audio (this is a combination cable that includes DVI video, USB along with speaker and mic)
- 2 x DVI
The only cables you'll need to provide yourself are the ones to connect the switch to your monitors (for me, these were two Amazon Basics DVI-to-HDMI cables).
It's also worth pointing out that I have a Logitech wireless keyboard/mouse and with the receiver (that had previously been plugged into the back of my PC) plugged into the back of the Aten, they both work flawlessly. You can also plug USB devices into the Aten and they behave as if they were plugged into the machine directly.
All in all, I'm hugely impressed and can highly recommend this device to anyone looking to share two monitors between two systems.
EDIT: I've been using the Aten for a couple of days now so thought I'd update this. I did notice a problem that I hadn't initially spotted, namely that the sound was not coming through the attached speakers when using the laptop (it was working fine with the desktop). I logged a call with Aten via their website (you need to register your product first, but I'd done that already) but I actually resolved the issue before receiving a response - it was because the Windows sound settings had the internal laptop speakers set as the default audio device. Once I changed the default to be headphones (because the audio connection from the Aten plugs into the headphone socket on the docking station), everything was fine and the sound came through the speakers. I did receive a very rapid response from Aten support that was pretty comprehensive and suggested a number of things to try, but as I'd resolved the issue I didn't need to do anything. However, in the meantime I'd also noticed that the hotkey combinations were not working (i.e. the ability to change between computers using keyboard commands). I mentioned this in my followup to their initial response and I received an email a short while later asking me to check that I had the wireless received plugged into the USB port specifically for the keyboard on the back of the Aten...which I hadn't. Once I rectified this, the hotkeys worked just fine.
So I can confirm that as well as the product being excellent, the aftersales support is also excellent, which is an important factor when purchasing a product like this.
| USBポートの総数 | 2 |
|---|---|
| 防水性 | IP54 |
| 電池付属 | いいえ |
| 電池使用 | いいえ |
| ブランド名 | ATEN |
| メーカー | ATEN |
| 製品型番 | CS1642A |
| 発売年 | 2013 |
| 製品サイズ | 2.62 x 7.68 x 4.56 cm; 560 g |
| 商品重量 | 560 グラム |
