Thunderbolt USB C port power

[mikejustis]

Hi all, I have the Hero Z590 running Windows 11 with BIOS 1301. I use the Thunderbolt USB C E1 port in the back panel to charge my phone. While my comp is on it works great, while its off it doesn't give a charge...I am sure its a mobo setting but don't know where. It used to work but I think when I updated BIOS it turned off. Any ideas?

[mikejustis]

No ideas?

[Mobbmann]

I have been having the same issue with thunderbolt. I'm surprised ASUS has not answered this simple question in over a week...

[xeromist]

Mobbmann wrote:
I have been having the same issue with thunderbolt. I'm surprised ASUS has not answered this simple question in over a week...

ASUS doesn't address most posts on this forum because it's primarily a community forum. For immediate support always contact through official channels like phone or live chat. The phone support people may or may not have documentation on this topic but it's worth asking.

I do agree with the other poster that Thunderbolt is a different animal than USB. Depending on the implementation certain power states may have little to no functionality while the USB controller is still powered. That means front ports could be designed to behave differently than rear, especially since front IO is more likely to be used as a charging port for a phone.

[mikejustis]

Agreed...it is nice to know I am not going crazy.

[Mobbmann]

Your not, Ive made a support ticket over the phone and supposed to get a call back in 24/48 hours. I'll post any solutions I find, if any.

[plee5509]

mikejustis wrote:
Hi all, I have the Hero Z590 running Windows 11 with BIOS 1301. I use the Thunderbolt USB C E1 port in the back panel to charge my phone. While my comp is on it works great, while its off it doesn't give a charge...I am sure its a mobo setting but don't know where. It used to work but I think when I updated BIOS it turned off. Any ideas?

This is probably by design. Does the manual say it will still charge in standby?

When in standby or shut-down, then your power supply is also turned off. Only a 5 volt standby power supply is supplied to the motherboard, this is officially only there to allow the power button to work, power up the Intel ME chip for remote management, and if set to suspend to memory, then some current is used keeping the memory refreshed. Most power supplies only supply 2 or 3 amps of this standby power, with a lot of that powering the bits explained above, leaving little left over to supply the required 5 volt @ 3 amp that the Thunderboard USB-C charger is required to supply, therefore it can't work when the PC is off.

[geneo]

plee5509 wrote:
This is probably by design. Does the manual say it will still charge in standby?

When in standby or shut-down, then your power supply is also turned off. Only a 5 volt standby power supply is supplied to the motherboard, this is officially only there to allow the power button to work, power up the Intel ME chip for remote management, and if set to suspend to memory, then some current is used keeping the memory refreshed. Most power supplies only supply 2 or 3 amps of this standby power, with a lot of that powering the bits explained above, leaving little left over to supply the required 5 volt @ 3 amp that the Thunderboard USB-C charger is required to supply, therefore it can't work when the PC is off.

Thunderbolt (and USB ports) charge my iphone fine when the PC is in sleep mode.

For USB at least, there is a BIOS configuration option to provide USB power in the soft-off state.

[Mobbmann]

The USB ports all work fine, (once you disable "allow computer to turn off this device to save power" in device manager) but the thunder bolt ports seem to be seperate from USB. Every other device I have with thunderbolt can at least charge a usb mouse/keyboard or phone.

On another note, why has asus still not answered this question here? are there any moderators?

[mikejustis]

All USB ports on backplate charge while off just the thunderbolt ports do not. The thunderbolt and usb ports on the top of the case (NZXT 701i) charge while comp is off. I did talk to support and they sent a link to download ASUS_Ai_Charger_V1.07.02_WIN10_64-bit...this did not work.