EDIT: Framework resolved this to my satisfaction, so be careful but I’m not angry.
So I don’t really have anywhere else to put this, but suffice it to say I got myself in a pickle. At some point (I have no idea when) the tongue on the USB-C connector of my 240W charger cracked longitudinally and the charger continued supplying power to my laptop and phone. It gave no indications of an actual failure and didn’t fail safe at all, which I have evidence of because during my troubleshooting process I tried to check if the laptop was the problem by plugging my phone into the charger instead. Then the phone started acting up- very rapidly charging and not charging, oscillating between the two. The entire right bank of USB ports on my FW16 is now nonfunctional, and the left bank seems to be limping along if the EC logs are anything to go by. The EC recognizes chargers and tries to negotiate, but the consumer FET just can’t switch anymore on that side.
I’m genuinely just heartbroken. I love this laptop and Framework so much and I’m so sad that this happened. For the love of God, Framework finagled a way to send me dGPU fans despite not stocking them because mine were failing- and they did it for free too! I’m out of warranty (on the mainboard, not the charger), they didn’t have to do that! This whole situation just absolutely sucks. I’m lucky my phone isn’t really worth much, and that it’s working for the moment at least.
I guess this is just a warning, BE CAREFUL WITH YOUR 240W CHARGERS. I’m guessing this was a freak accident, but not many things push that much power through a USB-C connector. Coulda been a void in the plastic, could’ve been something else. I feel like this only fits here ‘cause only the FW16 actually draws that much power.
I’m not leaving this comment for you Redeye, as you seem like you’ve done your due diligence, but I’m leaving this comment for anyone else who has a similar problem (but different) and finds themselves here.
If your USB-C stop responding, an easy thing to test is resetting the EC. There are 2 ways to do
Go into BIOS and hit the “Battery Disconnect” button, unplug the laptop from power, then save and close BIOS. Wait ~5 seconds, then plug power and turn back
Shut down laptop. Unplug from power. Wait 120 seconds. Plug in and turn back on.
Many people, myself included, have gotten their USB ports working again after doing this.
I can’t help but to both love & hate USB-C.
Love the reverse-able plug, convenience of one cable being able to serve multiple purposes. But I don’t like its tiny size and high density of connectors when it comes to charging.
That’s so unfortunate. I feel so sorry for you. I’m thankful when I had a problem I was able to just reset the EC. I’m gonna make sure to pay more attention to the power brick every time I plug in the USB C to try to prevent this
Hey @Redeye_43 That’s incredibly weird. Have you reached out to support about this yet? If not, please do so. Once done, please DM me the email address used and I’ll grab your ticket and work on it personally.
Yeah, conclusively broken. The issue is that the charger didn’t report that it was cracked at all, it cracked in a weird non-obvious way, and it didn’t even feel any different to plug into. That’s how my mainboard got damaged. I’m in touch with FW support, since this damaged other things it seems like it’ll be OK.
Framework replaced my mainboard, charger, and all of my expansion cards. They DEFINITELY didn’t have to do that last bit. Mailing the old mainboard back is gonna be a pickle due to general mechanical issues, but I’m pretty happy with this.
No compensation for my busted phone, but stuff just kinda happens sometimes. With the RAM shortage and all I get it.
The charger has no way of knowing, if the CC pins are still connected and the vbus ones aren’t shorted to ground all looks well to the controller. If some unfortunate high impedance io pin happened to also touch vbus it’ll take 48V to the face once negotiation goes through which will likely make it less high impedance and mess stuff up down the line.
The power muxing mosfets is one of the few parts that should not take any damage from that happening but the pd controller could well have taken a hit and not be able to switch them because of that.
