Framework13, AMD 7840 No longer sees Caldigit TS3+ thunderbolt dock

Framework Laptop 13 Linux
1

I’ve used my Framework AMD 7840 (Currently running Fedora 42) with a Caldigit TS3+ for almost 2 years. It’s been great - I have a 4k monitor, keyboard, mouse, audio hooked up to the dock. I plug the dock in and boom, desktop computer.

But today, it doesn’t connect. I have another machine which I “hotswap” the thunderbolt plug to and it sees the dock and works great. So the dock, the cables are fine. But when I swap the plug to my framework, nothing - just power. The blue light on the Caldigit stays dark.

I ran software updates, I rebooted. I power cycled the Caldigit dock. No improvement - my other computer still sees the dock just fine, but my framework does not.

I’m not certain when it failed because I was out of town for a few days and had powered my Framework off. I assume a software update did this, but I don’t know how to diagnose it.

I’m not a linux expert - if there are any commands I can run to gather useful information, let me know and I will.

2

Did you try to boot the laptop with the dock plugged?

I’m getting strange issue that my FW13 only “see” my TB4 dock when I boot with it plugged.
this started about a few days ago.

Sometimes only a cold boot helps.

EDIT:
Just tested on Windows 11, it does work, without issues, so is probably a Linux or Fedora issue.

@Shamyl_Zakariya can you try on windows or another distro?

3

Try running lspci and see if it recovers.

If it does I think I know what’s going on. There was a kernel regression (unfortunately caused by me!) and I can point you to a patch for it.

2 Likes
4

yep, lspci somehow “fixes” it, at least my USB4 SSD is recognized now, will try the dock later.

5

Wow… lspci did it for me as well. Since it sounds like this is a regression, and I have a workaround for the meantime, I’m feeling like I can be patient. Thanks!

FWIW, I was going to try an ubuntu live image this morning, but no longer need to.

6

I’m happy to manually run lspci until the fix for the regression lands.

Back in the early 2000’s I recompiled my kernel all the time (Gentoo, sigh), these days I don’t have the patience, confidence, or free time to do so. I’m happy to wait. But, drop a message here when the patch lands if you don’t mind?

Thanks!

7
3 Likes
8

I suggest you report this to your distro kernel and give them that link. They can take the patch early.

Sorry for the breakage!

2 Likes
9

I don’t see the fix mentioned in 6.16 release notes. Did I miss it or did it not get incorporated?

10

I guess it was merged, as I do not experience this since some 6.16rc’s ago

1 Like
11

It’s in 6.16.

1 Like
12

I’m happy I found this. I was starting to get really frustrated with Thunderbolt support on my Framework 16.

13

Hello, I just have the exactly same issue since this week. I use Framework 13 AMD 7840U with Fedora 42. This Tuesday I ran a regular system upgrade. After rebooting, the external monitor connected by CalDigit cannot be found (even with lspci). The interesting thing is that the keyboard worked as usual (only the monitor was not detected). I found the issue is caused by the kernel version 6.16.3-200. It went back to normal when I boot with 6.15.10-200.
I’m just sharing this workaround if anyone has similar issue.

14

Oh, no. Well, looks like I’ll hold off updates for a while. If you don’t mind, can you report back if a later update brings your monitor back?

15

I think this is the fix:

If I’m right, it was caused by a driver change in the common probe routine to work around a non-spec compliant monitor. It helped i915 but broke amdgpu.

Anyway, see if that patch helps. If it does you should raise it to Fedora to pull in sooner.

16

Just confirming, for anyone wondering, that the bug is indeed gone on 6.16 (to be more specific, I have upgraded from 6.15.3 to 6.16.4).

2 Likes
17

Have you updated to a newer kernel? Can you confirm that the issue that prevents your monitor from being detected persists?

18

Unfortunately, it persists in 6.16.7. I’m still using 6.15.10 which works perfectly fine.

19

Update: After upgrading to 6.16.8, the external monitor is back to normal! Gratitude to the Linux kernel team and all people who have helped.

One odd thing remains: during the booting process, when entering the password to decrypt the system, I am unable to use the keyboard connected via TS3.

Procedures to reproduce the issue:

  1. In the GRUB menu, the external keyboard works just fine
  2. In the system decryption dialogue, the external keyboard is not responding. Although the external monitor is showing. I can only decrypt the system via the laptop keyboard.
  3. After decryption, the external keyboard and monitor function as usual in the user login dialogue.

This issue did not exist in 6.15.10 kernel.

This is a very small problem and doesn’t really bother me. I’m just stating it so we are aware of it.

20

Can you try passing thunderbolt.host_reset=0 to your kernel cmdline and see if it enables the keyboard?

The easiest way to test it is to press e to edit the menu entry temporarily when you’re still in GRUB and press CTRL-X to boot with the edited configuration.