Dell Universal Dock D6000 doesn't power laptops

Make sure you're connecting to those systems via USB-C, not USB-A, aka "regular USB".  USB-A only ever supported providing power, not receiving power, and it also only supported up to about 12W of power max, so it obviously isn't suitable for charging a laptop.

I am having same problem.  Brand new, out of the box Dell D6000 is not charging Lattitude 7490 through USB-C (Apple like connector I think it is called thunderbolt). 

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@LordShiva wrote:

I am having same problem.  Brand new, out of the box Dell D6000 is not charging Lattitude 7490 through USB-C (Apple like connector I think it is called thunderbolt). 

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@LordShiva, it's just regular USB-C.  Thunderbolt 3 is optional on the 7490 rather than standard, but even if yours has it, the D6000 only uses regular USB-C rather than Thunderbolt.  Anyway, if you have a way to verify that your system can successfully charge from another USB-C source, such as another D6000 or a USB-C wall charger -- or if you have another system to test with to confirm that the D6000 fails to charge multiple systems -- that would be a useful test to run.  But chances are the D6000 is the culprit and simply needs to be exchanged.  However, if you don't need to use this dock with other systems that will need to connect via USB-A, you might want to think about getting the WD15 dock instead, or even the TB16 if yoru 7490 has Thunderbolt.  The reason is that the D6000 uses a DisplayLink chip to handle video, which introduces a lot of drawbacks I described in this thread, specifically the post marked as the answer.  By comparison, the WD15 and TB16 tap into the native GPU outputs available via that system's USB-C/TB3 connector.

I'm having the same issue with my Inspiron 3793 that's brand new.  I purchased 2 D6000's and neither power my laptop via the USB-C connection.  I've been getting the run around with Dell support and frankly I'm tired of and ready to return everything and switch to another manufacturer like HP.  This has been an extremely frustrating and disappointing experience.  I have neither the time nor the patience for this.  Please help!

@hpbjr  Taking a look at the Inspiron 3793's Setup and Specifications document, available on support.dell.com (direct link to it here), on Page 6 I see this under the description of the USB-C port:

NOTE: This port does not support video/audio streaming and Power Delivery.

Not sure you're aware, but both video output and system charging are optional capabilities of USB-C ports, and not all systems with USB-C ports have both capabilities, or either one.  The D6000 isn't the problem here.  The problem is that you're expecting the D6000 to do something that your system doesn't support.  And just fyi, there are several HP laptops with USB-C ports that don't support system charging and/or video output as well, so it's worth checking the specs of laptops you're considering if certain features are important to you.

@hpbjr  Building on my previous reply, if you want a 17" laptop that supporting charging via USB-C, your only option seems to be the XPS 17 9700.  It doesn't have a number pad if that matters to you, and it's quite a bit different in terms of specs, ports, and cost.  But the only other 17" Dell systems seem to be the G7 17 and some Alienware systems, none of which support USB-C charging at all because they're designed for high wattage power sources.  And even the XPS 17 9700 is designed for a 130W USB-C power source.  That's above the 100W max of the official USB Power Delivery spec, so the only places you'll find 130W over USB-C are from Dell's chargers and SOME of Dell's docks, since Dell did something proprietary on some of their products to stretch the spec to support 130W over USB-C.  But the D6000 is not one of those devices; it only provides up to 60W.  The two dock options you could go with would be the Dell WD19 180W (w/ 130W passthrough -- not the WD19 130W w/ only 90W passthrough) or the Dell WD19TB (comes standard with 180W adapter and therefore 130W passthrough).  If you use an XPS 17 9700 with a dock that supplies less power, then you'll either need to keep the system's power adapter connected as well to maintain optimal performance, or else put up with slower battery charging and/or reduced performance as the system attempts to adapt to an undersized power source.

I'm not as familiar with HP's product line, but I seem to remember someone else here mentioning that HP only implemented video output and system charging support on USB-C ports for laptops in their business-oriented lines, not their consumer-oriented lines.  Dell implements those capabilities more broadly than that, but the constraint in your case is the display size.  The Inspiron 3793 you have is from Dell's lowest-end line of their consumer lineup (the Inspiron 3000 Series), which is probably why you don't have a more fully functional USB-C port.  But Dell doesn't seem to offer 17" versions of their Inspiron 5000 and 7000 Series laptops at the moment (though they used to and may again at some point).  And the only other lines where they offer 17" displays are in systems that have high power requirements.  The XPS 17 9700 with its 130W requirement is actually on the low end of those systems.  The other 17" laptops I mentioned earlier are designed for 180W or more.

I have the EXACT same issue.  Bought an Inspiron 7591 a month ago brand new with new D6000 which was recommended by the website.  "A single USB-C cable connection allows you to transfer audio, video, data and power - enabling a fast and convenient docking experience. It also eliminates the need for an additional power adapter, keeping your desk neat and tidy." comes straight from the description of the product.  It doesn't provide power, troubleshoot over the phone and they ended up sending me a 'replacement' refurbished D6000.  Same problem.  Just out of curiosity I plugged in my commercial WD19DC and it does provide power.  In total I've spent probably 5+ hours over the phone and really didn't get any help at all.  I don't understand why this is so hard, maybe the most infuriating customer service experience I've had.

@RigbysMom  Well to add insult to injury, the D6000 really shouldn't have been recommended in the first place, for two reasons.  First, the D6000's reliance on "indirect display" technology called DisplayLink makes it a poor dock choice in general for any systems that have better options, like USB-C DisplayPort Alt Mode or (even better) Thunderbolt 3.  And your Inspiron 7591 offers the latter.  So unless you were trying to run a display setup more complex than dual 4K 60 Hz or triple 1440p, then the D6000 would have given you no benefit whatsoever over a dock like the WD19TB.  (The fact that they sent a DC instead is another puzzling choice for a reason I'll get to in a moment.)

And second, the D6000 only supplies up to 60W of power to the attached system.  According to Dell's online page, the Inspiron 7591 comes with a 130W power supply, so using the D6000 as a power source would mean you'd be giving it less than half the power it's designed to have available.  That will result in slower battery charging and probably reduced performance especially under load as the system attempts to reduce its power consumption to adapt to an undersized power source.

But the WD19DC is also a bizarre choice because it's specifically designed for systems that have two USB-C connectors.  It uses those in order to provide up to 210W of power to the attached system, but as a result it's only needed for systems that require that level of power, such as the Precision 7000 Series models.  The DC can certainly be used in single connector mode, but at that point it behaves just like a regular and much less expensive WD19, which is Dell's regular USB-C dock.

The better choice would have been the WD19TB, which uses Thunderbolt and therefore when paired with that system can tap into 4x more display bandwidth than the regular WD19.  The WD19 with that system can handle dual displays up to 1920x1200 each or a single 1440p display.  The WD19TB can handle dual displays up to 4K 60 Hz or triple 1440p displays.

All that said, although the WD19TB supports providing up to 130W to certain Dell systems, I don't know if your Inspiron 7591 is among them, even though it's designed for 130W.  Dell has certain 130W systems that support drawing that over USB-C, such as the last few generations of XPS 15s and Precision 5500 models.  But Dell also has several 130W systems in their Inspiron line that are confirmed NOT to support drawing that much over USB-C.  I'm not sure why.  You might find that your system is drawing less than that even from a Dell dock that would support drawing more, in which case you can still end up with slower battery charging and throttled performance.  Unfortunately in that case there's no fix other than to connect the system's own power adapter alongside the dock, because the system simply doesn't support drawing its required amount of power over the connection you'd use for any dock.

But at a minimum, given all the ways Dell has failed you here, I'd see if you can at least get a WD19TB instead of a WD19DC.  The DC isn't meant for your system, and while it does work, it won't work as well as the WD19TB would in terms of display setups you can run.  The WD19TB also allows you to connect a Thunderbolt peripheral to the dock, which wouldn't be possible through the DC -- and might be handy because the fact that your system only has a single Thunderbolt port means you wouldn't otherwise have a way to do that while docked.