USB3 issues on Haswell laptop

[sspiff]

I recently installed OpenBSD 5.6 on my laptop (Thinkpad Yoga), and at first things were fine. I tested a wireless USB module and got decent network speeds out of it.

However, yesterday and this morning, I've had several occassions where the USB didn't detect anything I plugged into my USB ports.

Upon inspection, `usbdevs` listed my digitizer for the touchscreen and some other internal USB devices, but not the stuff I plugged into my USB ports.

On some boots, USB works, but when I connected to the wireless network, I'd be able to use it for maybe 30 seconds, after which it starts failing (I'll update with some dmesg dumps tonight, no access to the device at the moment).

Sometimes I can get another 30 seconds of networking by unplugging the stick, plugging it back in, and reconnecting to the WLAN. Sometimes, the device is no longer detected.

I've had similar (but not identical) issues with Linux in the beginning of the year, not sure if this is the same problem. It was fixed a few updates later, but I'm not sure at which kernel version.

Some info which may be related:
I used a USB ethernet adapter to install the sets from the net. After installation I plugged in a random wireless dongle I had laying about, which worked out of the box (recognized as `urtw0`). My built-in wireless (iwn-7600) wasn't working, so I tried fw_update, but no dice. I think this may also have added/updated firmware for the urtw device, I'm not sure there's any firmware involved in the USB controller.

In summary:

1. USB worked when I first installed 5.6
2. After calling `fw_update`, I started seeing issues
3. Some boots, no USB at all
4. Some boots, flaky USB that breaks after a short while

[jggimi]

Hello, and welcome!

Originally Posted by sspiff

I recently installed OpenBSD 5.6 on my laptop...

Your thread subject says "USB3". Are you sure you're using 5.6, and not -current? USB 3.0 is in development, and to the best of my understanding USB3 is not enabled in 5.6. USB3 ports (the blue ones) don't function with 5.6.

My built-in wireless (iwn-7600) wasn't working, so I tried fw_update, but no dice.

Unfortunately fw_update(1) won't be able to obtain firmware from the network unless the network is already up and running. You can point fw_update at a manually downloaded package, if you need to do so.

I think this may also have added/updated firmware for the urtw device, I'm not sure there's any firmware involved in the USB controller.

No, the urtw(4) driver doesn't load external firmware.

If you believe firmware is the problem, you can check what fw_update may have installed for you with:

$ pkg_info | grep firmware

You may delete any of these firmware packages with..

# pkg_delete <name of firmware package>