Linux 4.18 Addition Helps Dell + Thunderbolt Systems

[phoronix]

Phoronix: Linux 4.18 Addition Helps Dell + Thunderbolt Systems

In addition to the secondary power management updates sent in on Wednesday for the Linux 4.18 kernel merge window, a set of ACPI updates were also submitted...

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Dell-Thunderbolt-OSI-4.18

[boxie]

that would certainly be a very shiny work machine.

[enrico.tagliavini]

In the last 5 years I always had a Dell, an XPS for work and something else for home (Alienware or Inspiron gaming laptops). Have to say I'm really happy about them as hardware by itself and also as Linux support. I especially love the recent work on LVFS allowing the firmware update directly from Linux using fwupdmgr.

I never used a TB dock however, very interested in hearing how it works.

[Venemo]

I have an XPS 13 9370 myself, and can confirm that it works quite well on newer Linux kernels - though should be even better with 4.18 where they fixed a bunch of ath10k driver crashes and similar stuff.

[microcode]

Sad that a standard set only a handful of years ago requires an even worse version of the User-Agent spoofing to function as expected.

[agronholm]

I have a Dell XPS 15 (2017 model) with the TB16 dock and it blows. Any high bandwidth data transfer, be it through the built-in Ethernet, USB disks, whatever, gets corrupted. This is with latest Fedora and latest firmwares.

[Michael]

I have a Dell XPS 15 (2017 model) with the TB16 dock and it blows. Any high bandwidth data transfer, be it through the built-in Ethernet, USB disks, whatever, gets corrupted. This is with latest Fedora and latest firmwares.

Interesting, thanks. What about the display support? That is my primary use-case for the dock would be to drive two displays.

[agronholm]

Interesting, thanks. What about the display support? That is my primary use-case for the dock would be to drive two displays.

I have two external displays hooked into it. The USB-C display works pretty much flawlessly but the DisplayPort one often stays black until I turn it on and off (sometimes several times). Probably has to do with the fact that it's an Acer and has no source lock function in its settings.

[Michael]

I have two external displays hooked into it. The USB-C display works pretty much flawlessly but the DisplayPort one often stays black until I turn it on and off (sometimes several times). Probably has to do with the fact that it's an Acer and has no source lock function in its settings.

Hmmm good to know, many thanks for the details. So far still leaning towards XPS + TB16. At least there's an uptick of activity in Thunderbolt recently that hopefully Linux 4.17~4.18 will be in good shape for this combination.

[agronholm]

Hmmm good to know, many thanks for the details. So far still leaning towards XPS + TB16. At least there's an uptick of activity in Thunderbolt recently that hopefully Linux 4.17~4.18 will be in good shape for this combination.

Well, good luck with that, but I'm not as optimistic about it. To me the problem seems to be the faulty design of the USB controller in the TB16 dock. I think Dell might have mitigated the problem somehow with a driver update, but I'm not sure. I've heard reports that it doesn't work properly even on Windows.