MacBook Pro ethernet adapters

Sootchucker

Sootchucker

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Hi guys. I have 2 MacBook Pro's - one is an older late 2013 13" MacBook Pro (with retina), and has the full sized USB 3 sockets as well as 2 thunderbolt 2 sockets. I use this one as it's smaller and lighter for most of my non image processing tasks.

My second (that I use for most of my heavy image and video processing), is my brand new 2018 15" MacBook Pro with Touch Bar. This has only 4 USB 3 (Thunderbolt 3) ports.

I'm looking for an ethernet adapter so that my NAS drives that are on my home network can be accessed faster than WIFI allows. I already have a 8 port gigabit router with 4 spare ports connecting my PC desktop, Smart TV etc., but was wondering if I had to purchase 2 different ethernet adapters, one for each Mac, or are there any adapters that would allow me to connect one adapter to the other MacBook or vice-versa ?

For instance, I can get a Thunderbolt 2 ethernet adapter for the older Mac, but could I then get a Thunderbolt 2 to USB3 adapter to allow it to plug into the other Mac, or the other way around, i.e. purchase a USB 3 ethernet adapter for the newer Mac, then get some sort of adapter to allow it to plug into the TB 2 sockets of the older Mac.

Is this possible or should I really just get 2 adapters ?

Thanks
 
I looked into this a while ago and if i remember correctly you will have to buy an adapter for each!

I ended up buying a hub for mine (thunderbolt 2) so I have ethernet, usb3, monitor, additional thunderbolt ports all connected via one cable to the laptop. It makes it much easier to grab it and go!!
 
Any usb to ethernet adapter will work on the USB ports. Just depends if you want to use the thunderbolt ports or not.
 
Great thanks for the advice guys.
 
worth checking also if the relative speed of USB3 is actually any faster than the wireless on your mac can support.
it might be that your local wifi router cannot supply the appropriate fast wifi signal.

A USB Ethernet adapter will still only supply up to the max speed of the USB 3 interface

USB 3.0 (also known as SuperSpeed USB) has a maximum bandwidth rate of 5 gbps (gigabits per second). That translates to 640 MBps (megabytes per second)—ten times faster than USB 2.0 (aka Hi-Speed USB).
 
Tdes said:
I looked into this a while ago and if i remember correctly you will have to buy an adapter for each!

I ended up buying a hub for mine (thunderbolt 2) so I have ethernet, usb3, monitor, additional thunderbolt ports all connected via one cable to the laptop. It makes it much easier to grab it and go!!
Click to expand...

AFAIK apple thunderbolt 2 to thunderbolt 3 adapter is bidirectional, I haven't tried it myself though
 
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