I am hoping you could assist me in figuring out what is happening with our laptops. It seems to happen at completely random times with no clear pattern as to why.
Every now and then our laptops stop recognizing the network adapter in the docking station. The computer will constantly flash an Unknown USB Device notification and when I check device manager the network adapter is no longer listed. I have tried to uninstall the Unknown device from device manager but when I plug the dock back in it just has the same issue. The weird thing is that I can plug that same dock into a different laptop and it would work just fine but if we plug the other one back in it will not work. USB, Display and power work just fine with the dock.
Do you have any idea how to resolve this because we can only play hot potato with all these docks for so long. We already lost track of who has used which dock… The drivers on the laptop are fully up to date.
Thank you for reaching out on the forums! I am sorry to hear that you are running into issues with your TBT3-UDC3, but I would be happy to help diagnose the issues here.
Some steps we’ll want to take are to perform a power-cycle of the unit to reset its internal hub chipset. We’ve seen that this can often restore the dock back to a working state when one or more of its functions are not quite working. To do this, please follow these steps:
Disconnect all USB peripherals and displays connected to the dock
Disconnect the docking station from host machine, then disconnect the power adapter from power
Leave unplugged for 1 minute for power to dissipate
Connect docking station initially into power only
Connect docking station to host machine, then connect USB peripherals and displays, then test for functionality
Please let me know if this helps at all.
If it does not help, I would like to have you try updating / reinstalling the Realtek Ethernet drivers for the dock. To do this, please follow the instructions below:
I have done the powercycling before and that does not help. The computer continues to show a unknown device. The same with the drivers. When the issue occurs that network adapter no longer shows up in device manager so I can’t uninstall/reinstall it. I guess I can just try to run the installer anyway. Next time this happens I will let you know if it worked.
The download I provided in the last message is intended to just be installed regardless of whether the issue is occurring at that moment or not. It is simply the main driver that the Ethernet adapter in the dock uses, so please follow the instructions on the installer and let me know if the issue reoccurs after this.
Alright it occurred again with the new docking station I set the user up with. It was constantly putting out notifications that it was an unknown usb device and the wired connection wasn’t working again. I installed the drivers and rebooted the computer. I will let you know if it happens again.
When you mention that you set a user up with a new docking station, can you clarify whether this was also a TBT3-UDC3, or a dock from a different manufacturer?