HX3PD, adding CC capability to port 4 & 5

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DaEr_349131
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Hi,

Looking at using HX3PD, but need two additional type-c ports.

Is it possible/easy (in fw) to add CC capability to port 4 & 5 using a separate CCGx part!?

thanks David

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Hi David,

Yes it is possible to make DS4 and DS5 as type-c ports. You can use an external CCG4 to control both ports.

Please make sure to add a USB 3.1 Gen2 Mux to switch the two SS lanes on each type-c port to one SS lane for the hub (since DS4 and DS5 each have only one SS lane going to the hub).

Also note that any downstream type-c + PD port on HX3PD can only be DFP and cannot be DRP/UFP (only power source). The external CCG4 needs to be configured as power sink​ source for both ports. Reason being, even if you sink power through the external CCG4, it will not be possible to share that power with the existing ports via the power system on the hub.

Regards,

Rajath

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RajathB_01
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Hi David,

Are you planning to make both DS4 and DS5 as two seperate type-c ports?

Regards,

Rajath

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Correct, those port must also support Type-C jacks, i.e. CC orientation and PD protocol for negotiating power (source or sink mode).

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Hi David,

Yes it is possible to make DS4 and DS5 as type-c ports. You can use an external CCG4 to control both ports.

Please make sure to add a USB 3.1 Gen2 Mux to switch the two SS lanes on each type-c port to one SS lane for the hub (since DS4 and DS5 each have only one SS lane going to the hub).

Also note that any downstream type-c + PD port on HX3PD can only be DFP and cannot be DRP/UFP (only power source). The external CCG4 needs to be configured as power sink​ source for both ports. Reason being, even if you sink power through the external CCG4, it will not be possible to share that power with the existing ports via the power system on the hub.

Regards,

Rajath

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Thanks Rajath,

To avoid the need for an additional CPU, is there room on the HX3PD cpu to run and control the CCG4's,

i.e. to ensure wa can provide the DFP (computer) with the meta-data / status of each port.

/david

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David,

To confirm, are you wanting to share the status of downstream ports (of external CCG4) with host PC (upstream)?

Regards,

Rajath

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Yes,

providing the same features as the full featured Type-C PD ports on the HX3PD.

Can we run our own custom code on the HX3PD in case we need some additional features like LED indication and such?

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David,

It is possible to share the DS status with US host. Can you elaborate what information you are interested to communicate through this interface?

The HX3PD firmware is a closed binary. LED indication signals might have to be derived from existing hardware.

I should also suggest that converting the existing type-c without PD ports to with PD will be more lenient with BOM.

But if you really require two type-c with PD ports in addition to existing ones (a total of 4 type-c with PD and 2 type-c without PD ports), then you can go ahead with external CCG4 and SS+ Mux.

Regards,

Rajath

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Thanks Rajath,

My plan was to share and control port-status, i.e. sink/source, PD status, current-draw as well as power-enable

for LED indication, we could of course consider adding a small cpu to handle this.

is there a serial-protocol over uart or i2c that we can use to pull this status from the HX3PD?

/david

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Hi David,

Yes it is possible. I should mention two ways of doing it:

1) Using an IO expander HW, drive GPIO's to generate LED status signals. (low BOM solution).

2) External CPU reading port status over an I2C interface with HX3PD.

Both require some changes in FW which the product development team needs to work with. If you can provide more details about the end product, business potential and production volume, I can discuss with the product team and let you know if they can schedule some time for this.

Regards,

Rajath

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Hi,

- Is there a i2c or uart protocol available in the existing HX3PD binary?

- Can we write our own code on the HX3PD and just link the binary for the closed-source PD stuff?

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Hi David,

Unfortunately there is no existing support for both of them right now.

This can be taken as a customer specific request for development.

Regards,

Rajath

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got it, please request this feature to be added, close this thread and contact me directly so we can discuss the requirements.

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