New HP Notebooks (17-ck2781ng) with Intel HM770 causing problems when using USB-Hubs

[Seppo007]

Hi there,

It has been some days since i bought my new HP (17-ck2781ng).
Some weeks before i bought another one from HP (17-ck2778ng) and sent it back because I encountered two separate issues:

1. regularly getting a black screen and freezing issues at low and high CPU/GPU utilization

    --> Fixed by not using an NVIDIA Driver 531.xx and staying on 528.49

2. all devices connected to the laptop via an USB-Hub (doesn't matter if attached via USB-C or USB-A 3.1 / 3.0) will get disconnected and instantly reconnected in the blink of an eye.

I sent back the first laptop i purchased mainly because of problem 1 but had the same issues with the lastly bought laptop I'm currently still using. But searching the web showed that the current 531.xx drivers from Nvidia caused the issue mentioned under point 1. Because that problem could be solved i focused on problem 2 which I didn't find a solution to so far. (Currently all my external devices [Razer keyboard, Bose sound system]) are connected directly to the USB Ports instead of a Hub --> no problems for several days.

Because of the fact that the USB-Hub error occured on the notebook I sent back and is also happening on the new one, I think that there is a correlation between the used motherboard / chipset of the newly available notebooks by HP that could be solved with a BIOS Update.

So what I did so far:

- I tested both notebooks with a nicely working (working without issues on two separate PCs) 2.1 USB Hub and also bought a new 3.2 USB Hub which also didn't work and has shown the problems mentioned under point 2.

- I tested a fresh installation of Windows 11 as well as Windows 10 --> same issue

- I tested all hardware components (CPU / GPU / RAM / SSD / USB-Ports / etc) with the HP Diagnostics UEFI tool on the laptop i already sent back without any hint of malfunctioning hardware (RAM test ~4 Hours / CPU test ~1 Hour / GPU test ~1 Hour / Full SSD test / 50 times the chipset check)

- I tested the hub only with one device attached --> same disconnect / reconnect problem

- I set up the laptop twice with different approaches (using only drivers from windows update / using drivers from HP page and then running windows update) --> same disconnect / reconnect problem

- I'm running the external devices on separate ports without a hub attached for now--> working for several days

I was never able to find any logs inside the Windows event log related to the hub-issue mentioned before

A system fix via dism / chkdsk didn't do any good.

So why is this behaviour so annoying after all? 

Firstly, when I buy hardware for > 3000€ I expect it to work smoothly with such a standard use case of using USB-Hubs.

Secondly, disconnecting and directly reconnecting the external devices leads to several unwanted behaviours:

- some games register losing an input device and pause the game (e.g. Returnal) which is breaking the immersion

- more disturbing is losing the connection of my Bose Audio System which is attached via USB. Sometimes when losing the connection windows does not recover that loss and is switching to internal speakers. I then have to manually switch back to the Bose Audio System from the windows audio settings

Hopefully someone of HP could engage with the hub problem and reproduce that behaviour so that it can be fixed with a new BIOS update.

Thank you for your time!

[BeemerBiker]

You may have 3 or 5 ports on your system.

(3) USB 3.2 Gen 1.0 Type-A ports; SuperSpeed 5 Gbps signaling rate (one on the left side)

NOTE: Left side port supports HP Sleep and Charge.
(1) Thunderbolt™ 4 with USB Type-C® 40 Gbps signaling rate (USB Power Delivery, DisplayPort™ 1.4, HP Sleep and Charge)

NOTE: Thunderbolt 4 available only with OMEN 17-ck2000 series.
(1) Thunderbolt™ 3 (40 Gbps signaling rate) with USB Type-C® 10 Gbps signaling rate (USB Power Delivery, DisplayPort™ 1.4, HP Sleep and Charge)

NOTE: Thunderbolt 3 available only with OMEN 17-cm2000 series.

I am not an expert on USB ports but  I have a lot of experience with external devices sharing bandwidth.  You might want to read this article about bandwidth allocation. ***

I assume you have a powered USB-3 (or C)  type hub and not a USB -2 that could lack Multi-TT. 

You should have ports on the left and the right.  I am guessing that these ports are on different root hubs.   Try to group device with the same latency or speed together and use the higher speed on one side of the laptop and the lower ones on the other side.

Other options:   Bring up the device manager and select each USB root  hub and do not allow the laptop to go in to low power mode.

You might also examine "events" both for the root hubs and the generic hubs for any problems.  Check also the windows event viewer for disconnect problems to spot a particular device that has problems.

***[EDIT]   For example:  if you have a USB3 SSD storage for game database it is possible all the bandwidth is allocated for an image transfer and other transfers on the same hub cannot timely take place.  This type of event is what is described in paragraphs 2 and 3 of that Microsoft article on USB bandwidth.  It would be solved by having the game database on a different root hub.

[Seppo007]

Thanks @BeemerBiker for your quick reply!

I would say it has nothing to do with the devices attached to the hub or the hubs themselves:
As i pointed out, the devices and the hub have succesfully been operated all the time on another PC (my old laptop, an HP Omen 17-cb1075ng).

I have to admit that i forgot to mention that i already configured all USB and BT devices in the device manager to not be able to be turned of to save power (as mentioned in your screenshot). But sadly that didn't do the trick.

And the two devices that are attached are a razer keyboard and a self powered USB Bose Sound System which just uses the USB connection to transfer data and not do drain energy.

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@BeemerBiker wrote:

You might also examine "events" both for the root hubs and the generic hubs for any problems.  Check also the windows event viewer for disconnect problems to spot a particular device that has problems.

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As i wrote before: There are no events popping up in the event log around the time the disconnect / reconnects happen (+/- 1 min)