ASUS Also Launches Thunderbolt 5 Add-in Card

[TheLostSwede]

Hot on the heels of Gigabyte, ASUS has also put its Thunderbolt 5 card up on its website, although there are some differences between the two. Obviously the physical appearance differs somewhat, but that's largely cosmetic. However, the one key difference is that the ASUS ThunderboltEX 5 only sports a single 6-pin PCIe power connector. ASUS still claims USB PD support of up to 130 W—a feature the company calls Flexible FastCharge—however, a single USB Type-C port is limited to a maximum of 96 W, which means you can charge your MacBook Pro at full tilt, but not some other laptops. Admittedly the 4 W discrepancy compared to the Gigabyte card is fairly minor, but the second port gets left with only 34 W, although that's still enough for charging most phones. Oddly enough, ASUS ThunderboltEX 4 card, allowed for up to 100 W on a single port.

ASUS has also implemented a single Thunderbolt 5 pin-header for the GPIO, SPI I2C and UART interfaces, plus a standard USB 2.0 header, for adding USB 2.0 support to the Thunderbolt 5 ports. Just as with the Gigabyte card, we find Intel's JHL9580 Thunderbolt 5 controller at the heart of the card and once again it uses a PCIe 4.0 x4 interface and supports up to three DP 2.1 8K displays at 60 Hz, although ASUS mentions that this requires DSC. The card features three mini DP inputs and comes with three DP to mini DP adapters, as well as the two aforementioned USB Type-C ports. Note that if you use tree displays, you can only use two Thunderbolt devices with the card. ASUS only mentions Windows 11 64-bit support, so it looks like Windows 10 won't be getting a driver and so far it would seem neither is Linux.



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[_roman_]

A similar USB 4 add in card for my ASUS mainboard requires a special bios version. In my case, a 100€ add in card for USB 4 which can not be reused is far too expensive for a niche.

Older add in cards I checked could officially only be used with certain mainboards, most likely also with certain mainboard uefi versions.

Most add in cards work only with their own brand. e.g. ASUS card with ASUS mainboard, MSI add in card with certain MSI mainboard , and so on.

Just be careful, there are a lot of limitations with those USB 4 / Thunderbolt add in cards. Look careful at the homepages and manuals and other hints please.

 

[Nanochip]

Regarding your comment about Linux not having a driver, it would appear that in kernel 6.5, intel brought up usbv2 support and also added barlow ridge support. I can’t say how well it works as I don’t have the hardware but support should be there for usb4v2/Barlow ridge in the current kernel.

see phoronix:

Linux 6.5 Adding Initial Support For USB4 v2, Intel Barlow Ridge - Phoronix

www.phoronix.com

Also regarding the skepticism of 130W usb-pd support due to 1 6-pin power plug, I would ask: couldn’t the card use supplemental power from the pcie slot to make up the difference ?

 

[TheLostSwede]

A similar USB 4 add in card for my ASUS mainboard requires a special bios version. In my case, a 100€ add in card for USB 4 which can not be reused is far too expensive for a niche.

Older add in cards I checked could officially only be used with certain mainboards, most likely also with certain mainboard uefi versions.

Most add in cards work only with their own brand. e.g. ASUS card with ASUS mainboard, MSI add in card with certain MSI mainboard , and so on.

Just be careful, there are a lot of limitations with those USB 4 / Thunderbolt add in cards. Look careful at the homepages and manuals and other hints please.

It's still USB4

Not most, all Thunderbolt and USB4 cards only work with the brand of motherboard that makes the card, due to the cards needing GPIO, SPI I2C and UART connectivity with the host system to allow for things like device sleep and what not. None of the motherboard makers appear to have been able to agree on a common standard for that connector and don't label the connectors, which means you can't mix and match the cards. It's apparently possible to make the Thunderbolt data interface work without those interfaces, but if a device goes to sleep, it's impossible to wake it up without power cycling it. Things like hot-plugging is also hit and miss, or at least used to be, without the extra interfaces.

Regarding your comment about Linux not having a driver, it would appear that in kernel 6.5, intel brought up usbv2 support and also added barlow ridge support. I can’t say how well it works as I don’t have the hardware but support should be there for usb4v2/Barlow ridge in the current kernel.

see phoronix:

Linux 6.5 Adding Initial Support For USB4 v2, Intel Barlow Ridge - Phoronix

www.phoronix.com

I hadn't seen that, but Asus doesn't point to any kind of Linux support on their product page, which is why I mentioned it.

Also regarding the skepticism of 130W usb-pd support due to 1 6-pin power plug, I would ask: couldn’t the card use supplemental power from the pcie slot to make up the difference ?

It depends on the slot and card design, a x4 slot is meant to be able to deliver 25 W of power, but it doesn't mean the add-in card has to draw that much power. Also, the USB PD power appears to only come from the extra power connectors on these types of cards. Someone complained about the Gigabyte card having two connectors, but to me that simply appears to be for 100 W USB PD per port.

 

[AnarchoPrimitiv]

I still think Intel should have skipped the PCIe 4.0x4 bandwidth and went straight to 5.0x4....the marketing practically demands it on its own....PCIe 5 with TB5.....that way you'd have 128Gbps both ways and a lot more options on the table.

Plus, I'm not a fan of the 120Gbps mode because I feel like it needlessly complicates it like USB 3.x....when shopping for a USB3.x cable, there's a bunch of things your average consumer have to check for....i.e. what data rate is it capable of, what USB gen, how much power delivery, and many times those specs aren't obvious. I feel like the same thing will be with TB5....again, I'm talking for your average consumer, not an enthusiast.

Either way though, 5.0x4 (128Gbps) bandwidth would have created a lot more possibilities....such as eGPUs finally having basically no performance gap versus in the mobo slot (it's basically a 3.0x16/4.0x8 connection which is enough for the majority of videocards), docking stations with 10Gbase-T networking (or higher), an integrated 4.0x4 nvme slot, alongside HDMI 2.1 ports, etc.

 

[TheLostSwede]

I still think Intel should have skipped the PCIe 4.0x4 bandwidth and went straight to 5.0x4....the marketing practically demands it on its own....PCIe 5 with TB5.....that way you'd have 128Gbps both ways and a lot more options on the table.

Cost and it would've limited the amount of motherboards you could plug it into without sharing bandwidth with the GPU? But yeah, it's bandwidth limited on the PCIe side as it is now.

Plus, I'm not a fan of the 120Gbps mode because I feel like it needlessly complicates it like USB 3.x....when shopping for a USB3.x cable, there's a bunch of things your average consumer have to check for....i.e. what data rate is it capable of, what USB gen, how much power delivery, and many times those specs aren't obvious. I feel like the same thing will be with TB5....again, I'm talking for your average consumer, not an enthusiast.

It's unclear what that mode will be used for so far, but my understanding was that it would mainly be used for DP, so 80 Gbps for DP, 40 Gbps for Thunderbolt or USB4 data.

 

[csendesmark]

Not most, all Thunderbolt and USB4 cards only work with the brand of motherboard that makes the card

What?
How is that possible?

 

[TheLostSwede]

What?
How is that possible?

Due to every motherboard manufacturer having unique pin-headers on their boards, as I mentioned, if you'd continued reading the sentence.
It's the only reason for it though.

 

[_roman_]

I'm not sure if the UEFI is also important.
Why would they add another UEFI section in the ASUS mainboard just for an ASUS USB 4 add on card? which is very specific for the usb chip on that card.

 

[TheLostSwede]

I'm not sure if the UEFI is also important.
Why would they add another UEFI section in the ASUS mainboard just for an ASUS USB 4 add on card? which is very specific for the usb chip on that card.

I believe that's not that difference between the cards though, but it's possible that is a white/black list type thing, so even if you try using a different card, it might not work or at least not work properly.

 

[kapone32]

What?
How is that possible?

I can confirm this. I had an Asus X570E E Strix and was using the add in card I kept from TR. It was an Asus card. My last hurrah for AM4 was X570S and it was MSI. When I put the Asus card it was not recognized. Once I put the add in card from the Unify it was recognized immediately. That was just a plain M2 adapter card.

 

[csendesmark]

Due to every motherboard manufacturer having unique pin-headers on their boards, as I mentioned, if you'd continued reading the sentence.
It's the only reason for it though.

Sorry,
I did read the whole post
Also have no idea of what GPIO, SPI I2C etc are
I though with my little brain that, those are simple PCIe 4× cards, which go to the PCIe 4× slot, and

I can confirm this.

I believe both of you - and then these cards are absolute trash.

 

[TheLostSwede]

Sorry,
I did read the whole post
Also have no idea of what GPIO, SPI I2C etc are
I though with my little brain that, those are simple PCIe 4× cards, which go to the PCIe 4× slot, and

In theory, yes, it's just a PCIe card, but due to it taking PCIe lanes and chucking them outside of your case to boxes that you can put PCIe devices in, those other "minor" signalling interfaces are also needed. They're involved in procedures such as sleep, wake, hot-plugging etc. so your PC doesn't crash when a device connected to your PC over Thunderbolt goes to sleep all of a sudden, as it hasn't been used for half an hour, or when you unplug a Thunderbolt device.
However, Intel clearly never made a standard connector decision on this, so Asus has one large connector, Gigabyte has two connectors, MSI has one large, ASRock appears to have different solutions for different cards...

And then you have HP...

 

[azrael]

So THAT'S what the second PCIe slot on modern motherboards is supposed to be used for. Just pray you don't need a third slot...

 

[dailing007]

I still think Intel should have skipped the PCIe 4.0x4 bandwidth and went straight to 5.0x4....the marketing practically demands it on its own....PCIe 5 with TB5.....that way you'd have 128Gbps both ways and a lot more options on the table.

Plus, I'm not a fan of the 120Gbps mode because I feel like it needlessly complicates it like USB 3.x....when shopping for a USB3.x cable, there's a bunch of things your average consumer have to check for....i.e. what data rate is it capable of, what USB gen, how much power delivery, and many times those specs aren't obvious. I feel like the same thing will be with TB5....again, I'm talking for your average consumer, not an enthusiast.

Either way though, 5.0x4 (128Gbps) bandwidth would have created a lot more possibilities....such as eGPUs finally having basically no performance gap versus in the mobo slot (it's basically a 3.0x16/4.0x8 connection which is enough for the majority of videocards), docking stations with 10Gbase-T networking (or higher), an integrated 4.0x4 nvme slot, alongside HDMI 2.1 ports, etc.

The bandwidth of Thunderbolt 5 bus is limited to 80GB, and the bidirectional bandwidth will not increase to 120GB

 

[Caring1]

So this won't work with an Asus X570 Tuf Gaming?
I have no idea where the Thunderbolt cable would attach internally.

 

[Tigerfox]

I very much hope this is compatible with my ASUS Prime X670E-Pro, not just with Z890.

 

[TheLostSwede]

The bandwidth of Thunderbolt 5 bus is limited to 80GB, and the bidirectional bandwidth will not increase to 120GB

80 Gbps per port that is, so 160 Gbps for two ports. PCIe 4.0 x4 is limited to 64 Gbps...

So this won't work with an Asus X570 Tuf Gaming?
I have no idea where the Thunderbolt cable would attach internally.

Not sure, Asus didn't provide a list of compatible motherboards.
However, your board doesn't appear to have a Thunderbolt header or whatever Asus calls it, which means it won't work.
Asus only appears to have 18 AMD boards that support Thunderbolt/USB4 add-in cards.

All series｜Motherboards｜ASUS Global

In ASUS 「All series」 - Motherboards / Components , you could find most appropriate Motherboards / Components based on product features, specification or price. And you also could get product's detail information and comparsion, even add it into the wish list in buy page.

www.asus.com

 

[dailing007]

80 Gbps per port that is, so 160 Gbps for two ports. PCIe 4.0 x4 is limited to 64 Gbps...


Not sure, Asus didn't provide a list of compatible motherboards.
However, your board doesn't appear to have a Thunderbolt header or whatever Asus calls it, which means it won't work.
Asus only appears to have 18 AMD boards that support Thunderbolt/USB4 add-in cards.

All series｜Motherboards｜ASUS Global

In ASUS 「All series」 - Motherboards / Components , you could find most appropriate Motherboards / Components based on product features, specification or price. And you also could get product's detail information and comparsion, even add it into the wish list in buy page.

www.asus.com

Yes, you can consider tbt5 as a combination of 4 40GB, bidirectional 80GB, or dynamically allocating 120GB+40GB using bandwidth boosting technology, while bidirectional PCIe is limited to 4x4

 

[TheLostSwede]

Yes, you can consider tbt5 as a combination of 4 40GB, bidirectional 80GB, or dynamically allocating 120GB+40GB using bandwidth boosting technology, while bidirectional PCIe is limited to 4x4

That's not what I wrote. The cards have two Thunderbolt 5 ports, each port can do 80 Gbps, which means 2x 80 Gbps.
You're also writing Gigabyte, it's Gigabit, hence small b.