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XPS 15 9550, WD19TB compatibility, #3
Hello All,
I've been considering purchasing a dock for my XPS 15 9550 (eventually plan to upgrade to a 9580 a bit after they release). I'm curious if the WD19TB would work with my XPS 15 9550. I understand it's not listed in the compatibility section, but was wondering what might be the reason? It's compatible with the tb16 w/ 240w power adapter; however, it's the wd19tb I'm interested in. I noticed the included Power Adapters only go up to 180w (I oddly happen to have a 240w 7.4mm barrel adapter on-hand, and the wd19tb is 7.4mm barrel)... I guess my three questions are A) if the 9550 would infact work with the wd19tb, but specific features would not function, and B) if the 240w 7.4mm adapter I have would work with the wd19tb (even if the 180w is potentially(?) enough). C) anyone tried the 9550 with wd19tb? Thanks everyone!
jphughan
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May 23rd, 2019 15:00
As you found, the WD19TB is able to offer 130W to attached systems even when the WD19TB itself only has a 180W adapter attached. I suspect the reason Dell was able to downsize the power adapter was because if memory serves, the TB16's Thunderbolt 3 "upstream" port for peripherals was rated to supply up to 60W, whereas the equivalent port on the WD19TB is only rated for 15W (I don't have the documentation in front of me to verify.) If that's the case, Dell no longer has to budget as much power for that port. Another possibility is that the WD19TB has more power-efficient components and the TB16 never really required the full 240W from the adapter to begin with, so only a bit more efficiency was needed to begin with. The 130W, 180W, and 240W AC adapters that Dell includes with their docks are all standard AC adapter capacities that Dell has offered with various laptops for years now, long before these docks existed, so if 180W was just a little bit short of requirements for the TB16, Dell would have just moved up to the next AC adapter level they were already manufacturing rather than creating yet another AC adapter.
As to whether a 240W adapter would work, I imagine it would given that Dell laptops have no problem being connected to AC adapters that offer more wattage than they actually need, but it might be a while before you find a WD19TB used without an AC adapter.
As for 9550 compatibility, that's trickier to answer. In theory, it should work because Thunderbolt 3 is a standard, and in fact thanks to Intel's new Titan Ridge controller, the WD19TB offers the additional perk of being backward compatible with regular USB-C (at reduced functionality), which isn't the case with the TB16, although of course the 9550 has TB3 as standard. But there are a couple of reasons I say that the compatibility question is tricky to answer. First, even though Thunderbolt 3 is supposed to be a standard, there are several well documented cases of interoperability issues. For example, MacBooks simply won't operate with peripherals that use the very first generation TB3 chipset that Texas Instruments made, for reasons that aren't clear. In some cases, peripherals don't work until a TB3 firmware update is installed on the host, and that became an issue specifically with the XPS 15 9550 because Dell kept that system at a very old firmware level for a very long time, even though it used the same chipset as the 9560 that got updates regularly (although the 9560 update didn't work on the 9550). They finally fixed that, but until that point, peripherals like TB3 to Dual DisplayPort adapters weren't usable on the 9550. And lastly, I'm seeing BIOS updates for other systems that specifically mention "Support for new WD19 dock family" in the enhancements list. I'm not sure what exactly that means, though, i.e. what happens if you try to use these new docks without that BIOS update. It might be that the dock works fine for regular use but certain technical features like the "Always Allow Dell Docks" BIOS security option and performing dock firmware updates are a problem. For the latter, at least with the WD15 and TB16, dock firmware updates are performed as a boot-time operation by the PC rather than within Windows, which requires firmware support in the PC for that process. As a result, those docks can't have their firmware updated by any random PC.
I suspect the only official compatibility answer you'll get from Dell (if you get one at all) is that the XPS 15 9550 isn't listed, likely hasn't been tested, and therefore won't be supported. But of course that doesn't mean it wouldn't work.
All that said, if you already have a TB16, the WD19TB doesn't really give you much. The main new features are backward compatibility and support for DisplayPort 1.4, but the XPS 15 9550 has TB3 and only provides DisplayPort 1.2. And unless the 9580 wires the USB-C/TB3 port to the discrete GPU rather than the Intel GPU as all previous XPS 15 systems have (and as most systems with multiple GPUs do), then the 9580 will have the same DisplayPort 1.2 limitation. The reason is that DisplayPort 1.4 support from Intel GPUs won't arrive until Intel's Gen 11 GPU rolls out. That will happen starting at the end of 2019 initially with the Ice Lake CPU platform used by the XPS 13, but the H Series CPUs that the XPS 15 uses aren't expected to get that GPU upgrade until sometime in 2020, long after the 9580 arrives. So the value proposition of the WD19TB when you already have a TB16 isn't very clear, unless the backward compatibility with USB-C is desirable for some other non-Thunderbolt system you have.
But if there's some reason you want it anyway, then I personally would just buy it and see what happens with the 9550. If it works, great. If not, then you can decide whether you want to keep it anyway for the 9580 that will certainly support it (even if it won't take advantage of DisplayPort 1.4) or simply return it for a refund.
Velocitydreamer
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May 23rd, 2019 14:00
I've found the 180w delivers 130w powder delivery (unlike the tb16 that requires a 240w adapter).
I'm still curious A) if the 240w block would work, if so, I could find a wd19tb used without power adapter for cheaper and use the 240w and B) what about the wd19tb wouldn't be compatible with the 9550...
Velocitydreamer
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May 23rd, 2019 15:00
Love the detailed answer! I'm big on the "why's" and you laid it out at a level I enjoy learning at. I'm very happy with your answer. Only thing I could imagine anyone adding, would be from experience with the 9550 and wd19tb. I appreciate it!
jphughan
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May 23rd, 2019 16:00
@Velocitydreamer happy to help! I'm big on the "whys" myself, so I like to share them too. :) Hopefully someone actually tests this setup for you. The only other potentially useful difference I forgot to mention about the WD19TB is that, if the WD19TB's documentation on this point is correct, it has a noticeably longer cable than the TB16 -- 0.8 m compared to 0.5 m. That was a fairly common complaint about the TB16, but it was unavoidable at the time the TB16 was introduced because back then, 0.5 m was the longest cable that could support TB3's 40 Gbps throughput and carry 100W+ of power. The only other option would have been to use an "active" cable that would let you go up to 1 m, but those were $60-85 apiece back then, and the TB16 was already pretty expensive especially compared to the legacy E-Port docks that it was replacing (the "why" for that is below if you're curious.) Anyhow, perhaps passive cable technology has improved in the 3 years since the TB16 arrived to allow a longer cable.
One reason the TB16 is noticeably more expensive than E-Port docks is because all Thunderbolt 3 devices have to go through a rigorous certification process with Intel, which isn't free. But the main reason, which incidentally affects the WD15 as well, is because these new docks have a bunch of controller chips built into them, whereas the E-Port docks were basically just glorified pin extensions from chips that existed within the PC itself. That's why the old E-Port dock connector on the underside of those systems had something like 240 pins, because the individual pins in the various ports on the E-Port dock ran all the way back to chips inside the laptop (with the possible exception of USB, where the E-Port dock might have had a hub chip -- not sure.) By comparison, USB-C/TB3 docks have an actual controller chips for audio, Ethernet, USB, DisplayPort MST, etc. built in, which adds cost. That's also why the new docks require drivers, which the E-Port docks didn't, and it also means that the Ethernet ports on these new docks can be used even with systems that don't have an Ethernet controller built in, whereas with an E-Port dock, the system needed to have an Ethernet controller built into it in order to run that port on the dock. And of course the new design also means that the new docks can be used with non-Dell systems.
Steffen82
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June 19th, 2019 14:00
@Velocitydreamer Did you give the WD19TB dock a trial with your XPS 9550? I’d be very interested in the outcome and your experience. Thanks!
Velocitydreamer
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June 21st, 2019 11:00
Had the opportunity to pick one up for $100 shipped open-box... couldn't come up with the money quick enough to get it (had just made a sizable purchase as was super broke lol). I'm still looking to get to this eventually; however, I'm also considering an ADATA SX8200 Pro 1TB for the 9550 at the moment... though, not so sure with what I seem to read about inconsistent benchmarking (QC?).
Velocitydreamer
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June 21st, 2019 13:00
Hey jphughan, in all your Dell wisdom, do you know if the new 7590 OLED screens would swap onto a 9550? I'm guessing connections and power would be different?
Velocitydreamer
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June 21st, 2019 13:00
I hear ya. Honestly, I've not found too much a reason to upgrade yet. The 9550 has been solid for me, so a modern dock would be ideal. I was looking to run two curved Samsung 21:9 monitors to gain some real estate for programming. I just ordered an ADATA SX8200 Pro 1TB SSD, and if I don't get toooo envious of the OLED on the new models, I'll just swap a 4k monitor on it and be happy :)
Steffen82
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June 21st, 2019 13:00
Thanks. I’m considering to purchase the WD19TB dock to connect my XPS 15 9550 notebook to my Dell UltraSharp U3219Q (with 4K@60Hz), network, ... . Unfortunately you won’t still find much when searching for experience on that setup :(
jphughan
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June 21st, 2019 15:00
@Velocitydreamer I'm assuming you mean the 9570 since I don't know of a 7590 system? If so, I can't say for certain, but I wouldn't bet on it. First, I've seen cases where if the system firmware doesn't recognize the connected built-in display, it just doesn't send a signal to it at all. Second, I have no way of knowing whether the 9550 and 9570 motherboards share a common display connector. And third, even if the display connector is the same, if it's in a different location on the motherboard, that could pose a problem because display ribbon cables are typically the exact length they need to be in order to reach the connector on the motherboard. So if the OLED panel's display cable is too short to reach the 9550's connector, obviously that won't work. And if it's too long, you might have some slack that would be hard to "bundle up" neatly in a system as tightly packaged as an XPS 15. I personally wouldn't be willing to spend the cash on this experiment, but if you decide to roll the dice, definitely report back! :)
Velocitydreamer
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August 7th, 2019 11:00
Sadly, I missed the deal where I could have had a 19 for dirt cheap. I ended up getting a 240w TB16, and it works fine for my needs. It's still in the works for me to get an ultra-super wide, likely a CRG9, but it'll be a bit. I'm going to have to figure out what to do when that time comes, for support of the resolution and refresh. and nab a new xps 15; though, I think it's the dock that has more to do with it...
Daniel1991
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August 7th, 2019 11:00
Did you get your hands on the WD19? And in that case, how did it work out for you?
Daniel1991
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August 7th, 2019 13:00
Thanks for the quick reply, I was actually not expecting that.
The price for the WD19 is also a bit high to pay to see if it actually plays along with the 9550.
Do you know if the TB19 can support two 2560x1440p and if it plays along with linux?
Daniel1991
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August 7th, 2019 13:00
Thanks again man! I have a WD15 which isn't powerfull enough, bought a Lenovo Thunderbolt 3 2. gen which wasn't compatible with the laptop, downgraded to 1. gen which doesn't charge the laptop. I might think I will buy the TB16 then.
I've heard that there is a fan inside of the TB16, is it something which is loud?
Velocitydreamer
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August 7th, 2019 13:00
Unsure about the Linux end of things; though, there is a decent bit of info about Dells and Linux out there, so you may be able to find your answer somewhere. As for the resolutions, I'm pretty positive it will handle two screens of that resolution. I'm pretty sure it's rated to handle dual 4k screens, which is higher than what you're even needing; though, you'll likely need to be using digital connections for both monitors and avoid using VGA is my guess.