Why have a crippled JHL6240 Thunderbolt 3 port in the GL502VM?

[link626]

The skylake and kabylake GL502VM have the JHL6240 thunderbolt controller.

the 6240 is a crippled half speed version, having 20gbps or lower bandwidth. pcie 3.0 x 2 lanes.

The 6340 thunderbolt controller has the full 40gbps bandwidth. pcie 3.0 x 4 lanes.

So our GL502VM is gimped, and putting a beefy graphics card in an eGPU box would result in a big performance penalty running at pcie 3.0 x2.
A GTX1080 in the XG Station will only be a slight improvement, and a super high cost.
Anything less than a gtx1080 egpu would probably have worse performance than the built-in gtx1060 of this laptop.


Thunderbolt sounds useless on the 502VM.

[Odysseus_]

Thanks U2Desire.
I looked in my device manger, under system devices, under PCI to PCI Bridge and found this: " PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_1576&SUBSYS_11112222&REV_00 " - which hopefully means, as you have suggested, that I carry the 40Gbps version. That would be most excellent as I really love this system in general. However, no Thunderbolt controller showing up in device manager and no Thunderbolt Generation showing anywhere under the Thunderbolt software. Thunderbolt software does show Package version: 16.2.52.250, Application Version: 16.2.51.18, Service Version: 16.2.52.3, Controller: Unknown, and Networking driver version: Unknown. I will revisit in full this "not knowing" issue that I have with my computer and all things Thunderbolt after the installation of my NVMe boot drives. By then I will at least have an actual Thunderbolt device for testing and troubleshooting.

Odysseus

[U2Desire]

Lucky you! Anyways like I said for some reason Device Manager and the Thunderbolt software stopped showing anything on mine but after reflashing the thunderbolt firmware everything shows up properly so if you have any problems just reflash thunderbolt firmware with latest version and it should fix things.

[andvoy]

Odysseus* wrote:
found this: " PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_1576&SUBSYS_11112222&REV_00 " - which hopefully means, as you have suggested, that I carry the 40Gbps version.

Hate to burst your bubble but that's just the PCI bridge that all alpine ridge chips have. You will also see a DSL6340 USB controller once you have something plugged in. The problem is with the actual TB3 controller that might still be a JHL6240, and that's the problem that we, owners of the 502 and 702 VM have :(.

[U2Desire]

When I look up the Dev/Ven info I get https://vendev.org/pci/ven_8086&dev_1576/ which states DSL6340 Thunderbolt 3 Bridge and in the wiki https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thunderbolt_(interface) shows "one "SP" (Single Port) version that uses a PCIe 3.0 ×4 link to provide one Thunderbolt 3 port (DSL6340)"

Where as the 502VM & 702 VM have PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_15BF https://vendev.org/pci/ven_8086&dev_15bf/ a JHL6240 Thunderbolt 3 NHI (Low Power) [Alpine Ridge LP 2016] which wiki shows
"an "LP" (Low Power) version that uses a PCIe 3.0 ×2 link to provide one Thunderbolt 3 port (JHL6240)."
So he does indeed have the 40 Gbps version.

[andvoy]

U2Desire wrote:
When I look up the Dev/Ven info I get https://vendev.org/pci/ven_8086&dev_1576/ which states DSL6340 Thunderbolt 3 Bridge and in the wiki https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thunderbolt_(interface) shows "one "SP" (Single Port) version that uses a PCIe 3.0 ×4 link to provide one Thunderbolt 3 port (DSL6340)"

U2Desire, I know what you mean, but I think you are mistaken. The https://vendev.org/pci/ven_8086&dev_1576/ is just the PCI bridge. The NHI is the actual controller device. For example in my GL50VM I have two PCI bridges the https://vendev.org/pci/ven_8086&dev_15c0/ and even the https://vendev.org/pci/ven_8086&dev_1578/. The NHI is the actual PCI device that will tell you which TB3 controller you actually have. In case of the GL502VM sadly it's the https://vendev.org/pci/ven_8086&dev_15bf/

[U2Desire]

He will have to flash his Thunderbolt firmware than go into Device Manager, Select View than Show hidden devices than it should under System Devices as Thunderbolt(TM) Controller - ???? the ???? for our crippled units is 15BF if his shows 1575 than he has the DSL6340 controller.
For our crippled units the bridge is PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_15c0.

This is the Thunberbolt 3 Devices

DSL6340 Thunderbolt 3 NHI [Alpine Ridge 2C 2015] 1575 PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_1575
DSL6340 Thunderbolt 3 Bridge [Alpine Ridge 2C 2015] 1576 PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_1576

DSL6540 Thunderbolt 3 NHI [Alpine Ridge 4C 2015] 1577 PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_1577
DSL6540 Thunderbolt 3 Bridge [Alpine Ridge 4C 2015] 1578 PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_1578

JHL6240 Thunderbolt 3 NHI (Low Power) [Alpine Ridge LP 2016] 15bf PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_15bf
JHL6240 Thunderbolt 3 Bridge (Low Power) [Alpine Ridge LP 2016] 15c0 PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_15c0

JHL6540 Thunderbolt 3 NHI (C step) [Alpine Ridge 4C 2016] 15d2 PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_15d2
JHL6540 Thunderbolt 3 Bridge (C step) [Alpine Ridge 4C 2016] 15d3 PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_15d3

JHL6340 Thunderbolt 3 NHI (C step) [Alpine Ridge 2C 2016] 15d9 PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_15d9
JHL6340 Thunderbolt 3 Bridge (C step) [Alpine Ridge 2C 2016] 15da PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_15da

[andvoy]

U2Desire wrote:
He will have to flash his Thunderbolt firmware than go into Device Manager, Select View than Show hidden devices than it should under System Devices as Thunderbolt(TM) Controller - ???? the ???? for our crippled units is 15BF if his shows 1575 than he has the DSL6340 controller.
For our crippled units the bridge is PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_15c0.

Yup, that is excatly what I ment. The Thunderbolt(TM) Controller is the PCI NHI device not the Bridge.

[Squiggy]

Controller and Bridge are the same chip. Which means Odysseus has a DSL6340 controller / bridge which is a Gen 3x4 Thunderbolt Controller / Bridge.
From https://thunderbolttechnology.net/blog/thunderbolt%E2%84%A2-3-controllers-launch-6th-gen-intel%C2%AE...
"The Intel Thunderbolt 3 controllers that power all this capability, codenamed Alpine Ridge, are formally called DSL6540 for the dual-port version, and DSL6340 for the single-port version. These powerful controllers provide 40Gbps Thunderbolt, USB 3.1 (10Gbps), and DisplayPort 1.2 all behind a single USB-C port. They are powerful enough for a workstation, yet small enough for a 2-in-1. Last month Intel announced the USB 3.1 certification of the Intel® Thunderbolt™ 3 controller and is among the first to pass this level of acceptability set forth by the USB-IF industry group’s compliance program. Thunderbolt 3 controllers provide two ports that include USB 3.1 support with dedicated bandwidth of 10 Gbps each, instead of shared, providing more bandwidth than other USB controllers#. These controllers are in production now for use in computers. "-

[andvoy]

Squiggy wrote:
Controller and Bridge are the same chip. Which means Odysseus has a DSL6340 controller / bridge which is a Gen 3x4 Thunderbolt Controller / Bridge.

Gaaah, this is so frustrating. How can you say that if the PCI devices that I have in my GL502VM are:

DSL6540 Thunderbolt 3 Bridge [Alpine Ridge 4C 2015] 1578 PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_1578
JHL6240 Thunderbolt 3 NHI (Low Power) [Alpine Ridge LP 2016] 15bf PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_15bf
JHL6240 Thunderbolt 3 Bridge (Low Power) [Alpine Ridge LP 2016] 15c0 PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_15c0

[U2Desire]

Think you better go through Device Manager again the DSL6540 chip is Dual port version of DSL6340. It would only be used in a laptop that has 2 Thunderbolt 3 ports. It could also be that the ROG XG Station 2 has a DSL6540 in it and that is why it is now showing in your Device Manager.