UD-CA1 questions with Dell XPS 13 9360

Hi Plugable!

1st time customer and I just received my UD-CA1-EU via Amazon. It is mostly working superbly - Charging, Gigabit Ethernet, HDMI and a Logitech Unifying wireless USB keyboard all working flawlessly to date :). Seems a great piece of kit.

I have two outstanding issues though, both of which are almost certainly not a problem with your product but which I thought you might have some info on from your testing:

  1. I purchased a 2M USB-C cable (https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B…), mainly because ideally I need the length, but also because, honestly, I could not find any info on Amazon on whether a cable was included with your product (maybe something for you to think about for the future?).

The above 3rd party cable works for charging and USB but not for Ethernet or HDMI. The devices were just not found - like they didn’t exist. Your cable (which fortunately WAS included) works perfectly. I am new to USB-C, but is there anyway to determine if a cable will support all the features of your dock? I really do need to find another 2M cable.

  1. I cannot for the life of me get the Dell 9360 to wake from sleep with a connected USB keyboard. I have tried with both the Logitech wireless keyboard (with Unifying USB dongle) and with a conventional wired USB K/B, plugged into your dock.

The Dell BIOS for the 9360 now talks about “Wake on Dell USB-C Dock” only; There is no general “USB Wake Support” option. It is enabled. Does this mean USB keyboards can only wake the laptop if connected to a Dell docking station or do you believe that your Docking Station should be able to wake the laptop from sleep? If you do, any tips?!

I have tried enabling “allow this device to wake the computer” on the keyboard (enabled by default anyway) and all the USB hubs in the chain, although that isn’t normally needed. I have also tried disabling “allow the computer to turn off this device”, which also should not be necessary. However, neither of these steps helped anyway!

I realise this may be more of a question for Dell, but

a) I thought you might have discovered an answer in your testing

b) frankly, from reading this forum, I am sure I will get a more intelligent answer from you than from some Dell 1st line agent, who will most likely tell me either “we only support Dell supplied peripherals” or “I suggest you reinstall Windows from recovery media”!

Thanks for any help you can provide :slight_smile:

Hi Jong.Gb, thanks for posting and I will be happy to help!

Thank you for the descriptions of the issues you are seeing. In looking at the specifications of the USB-C cable you are using, it appears that it is a USB 2.0 cable, which would explain why only charging and USB functions work. While we do only recommend using the cable that came with the docking station, you may be able to use a USB-C 3.1 Gen 2 certified cable or Thunderbolt 3 certified cable. Please keep in mind that with the amount of different cables and variation on the market, not all cables may work. USB-C/Thunderbolt 3 are still very new to the market and has had some confusion surrounding it. Unfortunately, I cannot guarantee a specific 3rd party cable to work.

Regarding waking from sleep, we may be able to help by making sure the USB, Thunderbolt 3 drivers and BIOS are all up to date per Dell’s site and I would be happy to examine some log files from your system. To help us do so please download and run our diagnostic utility PlugDebug –> http://plugable.com/support/plugdebug with everything connected. Please send us the file that is created on your Desktop by attaching it to an email to our direct support email address at support@plugable.com with ‘Ticket Number 181006’ in the subject line and we will match things up from there.

Additionally, one quick thing to check would be to temporarily remove our dock from your system and then connect your keyboard and mouse directly to the USB Type A port on your system to see if it can be woken from sleep. This can help determine if things are isolated to our dock or if the same behavior occurs while directly connected.

Thank you,

David W.
Plugable Technologies
www.plugable.com/support

Hi David,

Ah, yes, I can see the reference to USB 2.0 now! I assumed (as a noob to USB-C) all “USB-C” cables were also USB 3.0 compatible. Stupid me. Quite confusing!

Regarding wake from sleep I am pretty sure the problem is with the Dell BIOS. You can see from my last post that the Kaby Lake XPS 13 no longer says “USB Wake Support” in BIOS but instead “Wake on Dell USB-C Dock”. I will try your debug utility, but I really suspect that the OS just is not seeing any kind of wake request. I have already tried the USB-A ports and they do not work, even with a simple USB wired keyboard.

Limiting wake to a Dell Dock only seems unfair on customers and on suppliers like you, especially when your dock seems to work perfectly in all other ways. Maybe you could discuss with them relaxing the restriction to their BIOS?

Jon

Hi Jon, thanks for the reply and taking the time to confirm those variables. I do not have additional steps to suggest so waking from sleep can work while directly connected or via our dock.

We do not have a relationship with Dell to facilitate these conversations, unfortunately.

Thank you,

David W.
Plugable Technologies
www.plugable.com/support

Thanks David. Unless you are saying you have confirmed this is a BIOS limitation with your own testing, I will collect your diagnostics. But, I admit, I’m not hopeful!

Jon

BTW, as you might expect, this pointless Dell BIOS limitation also affects WoL. The Ethernet port on the UD-CA1 cannot wake the XPS 13. Fortunately, not a huge issue with a laptop, but still.

And lastly… just in case anyone else looks into this, the Dell BIOS also says that “Wake on Dell USB-C Dock” only works if the laptop is connected to the AC adapter, which seems odd as I think the Dell dock can provide power. I did try the UD-CA1 with the Dell supplied adapter connected but unfortunately that does not help.

Hi Jon, thanks for the replies. Understood that you aren’t hopeful of the results. If you would like to try investigating, please just let us know and we can examine the aforementioned log files to see if there are any steps we can suggest to try.

Thank you,

David W.
Plugable Technologies
www.plugable.com/support