Kinda like how cars have "blank" buttons in them that you can't press. The top trim level of the car may use up all these buttons, but the manufacturer doesn't create a separate component that eliminates the unused buttons on lower level trims. Instead, they leave the buttons blank and just make them unable to be pressed.
Don't forget the production loss of having to stop the machines, swop out the molds, run test injections, update all the robotics to the new part, and then do it all again next week, because the industry runs on a just in time production model.
What drives me crazy is all these vehicles switching to shit like tiptronic.
"No, you can't have a manual transmission. But we added these paddles so you can tell the automatic transmission to shift up on command, what more could you want??"
Seems like its more the norm than the other way around. I've had multiple vehicles over the years with some crappy system I didn't use that worked like that. Plus similarly to AWD switches in some vehicles, those can be temperamental and I've seen cars where they basically got stuck in that faux manual mode.
I just bought a newest-gen Mazda 3, and it still has mostly physical buttons. Physical buttons for HVAC controls, physical buttons for driving mode selection, physical buttons to turn on and off traction control and driving assists. It still has Apple Carplay with a nice screen in the dash, but it's not even a touchscreen. I have a little wheel/selector in the center console to navigate the screen.
Actual buttons weren't high on my priority list, but they were definitely a plus when I car shopping.
My Dodge Magnum is the same way. At least with a station wagon you can still access the cargo area pretty easily by folding the back seats.
I keep a battery jump starter in the back but if you can't access the trunk with a dead battery they're small enough to fit under a seat or possibly even the glove box.
It actually is a touchscreen. You just cannot use the touch feature when you're going moving over 5-10 MPH. They further disincentivize using the touch screen by placing the screen just out of comfortable reach.
Just my take here, but they probably realized that making it non touch entirely might be an issue if some random app in android auto/car play has a 'button' that does not play nice with their controls.
>It actually is a touchscreen. You just cannot use the touch feature when you're going moving over 5-10 MPH.
Mine has no such feature. I'm literally sitting in my car in Park right now and nothing happens when I touch the screen.
My wife has a CX-5 and it has the same radio/menu navigation "Commander" as Mazda calls it. The screen had touch ability but would send ghost commands as if someone touched it. A new OEM screen is over $200 and she never used the touch feature so I disconnected the cable to disable it completely. Now it's a regular screen.
I think we are potentially coming back round to them. Volkswagen seems to have indicated that they've realised how pissed off their move to touchscreen centric cars has made everyone and will be heading back to buttons.
Pinch of salt, believe it when you see it etc etc...
>Volkswagen seems to have indicated that they've realised how pissed off their move to touchscreen centric cars has made everyone and will be heading back to buttons.
It isn't even that, touchscreens are a risk compared to physical buttons. Touchscreens require you to remove your attention from the road to see where the button is while you can feel for a physical button without removing your attention from the road.
My car feels like the perfect mix of stuff. My climate control is all physical knobs (there's the option in the infotainment but I never use it). In the center console there's a small physical knob for volume, push it to mute, click left or right to seek or go to the next track. There's a larger knob that I can use to scroll through things in the infotainment easily as well. Stuff like changing the input source from my phone to radio. I rarely touch the touchscreen.
It works really well for me. The infotainment system has a lot more useful information than what you get from older all physical cars while still having easy to use and index physical controls.
I think we are potentially coming back round to them. Volkswagen seems to have indicated that they've realised how pissed off their move to touchscreen centric cars has made everyone and will be heading back to buttons.
Pinch of salt, believe it when you see it etc etc...
My car is a 2022 and still has tons of buttons. Its kind of overwhelming. I actually wish half if them had just been part of the touch screen, it would be less confusing.
Some Cars even have microphones and all that stuff installed but no phone calling, enabling it costs a few 100€ and they just put a code into your infotainment system to enable the existing feature
I don't actually have an issue with this, so long as I am getting a cheaper car as the tradeoff.
Yes, it seems silly on the surface to pay for something that's already in the thing you bought, but if economies of scale mean the manufacturer can use some of the same parts and charge a higher price for models that have it enabled as standard, what do I care if the cheaper one I buy has it disabled and purchasable or simply doesn't have a mic in it at all - so long as the price is identical in both scenarios?
Subscriptions for car features though? No. Fuck that shit.
I purchased a program and dongle combo that allows me into any car's system and allows me to enable/disable the different options.
For instance, on my Mazda 10, I was able to change the shift points to be more in line with what they should be to get the best gas mileage and performance out of it.
MG-Rover actually had different panels on the Rover 75 / MG ZT. The top trim specced with all the options would have five buttons, the lowest had none, so they had six different versions (0, 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 holes). And of course, all those panels were available in a selection of colours matching your dashboard.
Even in poverty spec there were no blanking covers to be seen.
Same fuse panels too. Sometimes the wires in the harness will also be there and you can pull the parts from an upgraded model and install them. I was thinking about installing power windows on my Kia. Everything is there except the buttons, fuse, and motor assembly.
I have a chest freezer with two toggle switches that don't do anything. I assume reusing the power/control module was cheaper than buying (or setting up tooling for) a separate module without the buttons.
It's also possible it wouldn't work if you soldered one on. Just because the board has the input doesn't mean the chipset or bridge have the functionality.
Many cars that don't come with heated seats as standard still have everything in the seats to make them work, the only thing that's missing is the buttons and maybe part of the wiring harness but usually it's there. Still people went mad when Tesla started giving people that bought a lower trim car that didn't have heated seats as standard the option to buy it because they could add it in later with software.
And to be fair, it makes it nice when someone is installing modifications; ie A Lightbar or something. Gives a spot for the button to go, instead of having to cut through somewhere, or create a dodgy button out of the side of somewhere.
I've seen tons of cheap garbage laptops like these while working as a tech.
I've seen:
Missing USB
Missing RJ45 (Which is what we have here)
Traces for RAM chips
Empty space where a GPU and it's VRAM are on another model
A space in the case for an optical drive, filled in with plastic, sometimes the SATA port was there.
A space for 2.5" drives, again, both with and without a port.
M.2 traces, once I've seen a whole port, but it was disabled in bios, no way to enable it, short of flashing the bios I guess.
Random missing chips.
Empty connectors for stuff like touchscreen, keyboard backlight. Sometimes the connector is there, fully functional, but nothing to plug into it.
Sometimes you could even see on the chassis where the port was supposed to be.
Some 15" laptops I've seen could fit in an 11" chassis given how little was actually there. A small board with no upgradability or repairability for that matter, a spicy pillow in grey pouch form, a weirdly long ribbon cable soldered to both the mobo and a daughter board with 2 USB and 1 jack, and wires thinner than your hair for the 2W speakers. Nothing else.
Now, that's common in the industry, but it's especially common on cheaper laptops, because what you see in those is the most barebone board possible for that model. Sometimes the manufacturer doesn't bother to redesign the chassis for a few generation and so you get stuff like the optical and 2.5" drive space filled with plastic.
The extra space for a HD has been common since the 90s.
They would leave the space for an expansion, similar to a desktop.
Only issue was you would have to spend hours disassembling and reassembling them. It was easier to just add an external and usually much cheaper since 3.5" were more common
Yeah, but now that space is filled in with plastic, you can't even put an HD there anymore, it's a remnant of an older case design they reused to save even more money.
Lenovo has that thing on some older thinkpad (and by older I mean 7th/8th gen, things like that) where there's an M.2 on the board and a 2.5" drive bay that has the caddy, but no drive and no cable. There's two version of that cable, either you can put in a SATA drive, or an NVMe/SATA M.2 drive. The connector is there, so if you buy the missing hardware, you can add storage pretty easily.
True. I have worked on products where the only difference between the cheap model and the expensive one was a bit flipped in software. Same exact device.
When manufacturing there is an obsession with making the process as simple as possible to manage, just having multiple SKUs and different parts could confuse the guys working on the assembly line, so it all has to be foolproof.
My last pre built PC had a labeled space for an AGP slot. I felt so ripped off I vowed to build my next one. By then PCIE was a thing and I made damn sure I had one.
I think there is a lot more nuance to it.
Often, its literally cheaper manufacturing wise to just give everyone the best thing, and only for reasons of capitalism and eternal non stop growth do we have people suffer through low end hardware.
USB doesn't have controllers (outside the SoC or chipset) anymore, especially USB2.0.
It'll be for an optional port (ports are in pairs in USB2.0), perhaps if the internal webcam or bluetooth wasn't fitted.
I/O boards broken out like this are common between a lot of models, it could even be that this model has all the wires run and just needs the port soldering down. If so, C1905 would need to be added.
> USB doesn't have controllers (outside the SoC or chipset) anymore, especially USB2.0.
Depends on the SoC; a lot of devices don't have USB2.0 HS (or faster) PHYs on die and rely on external PHY chips connected via ULPI.
Even so, the missing part appears to be ethernet and the missing IC is the magnetics for it.
https://totallaptopsolutions.com/products/dbpgk5mpf5-0n10-usb-audio-pc-board-w-cable-gwtn156-2bk-grade-a-compatible-with-gateway
Don't be so pedantic... USB DOES have hubs, its definitely a missing chip there it may be a USB isolator or something though but it clearly part of the USB circuit.
[seems like the xbox one X has NVMe solder pads and even the stamped metal casing as a place for the NVMe.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EpFKDzmMnao)
>!didn't work out!<
Very common. Sometimes you'll find whole footprints for GPUs and VRAM on the mainboard. They reuse the same PCB for several models with different features to lower design cost. You might be able to add the components. Often you'll find a grid of solder blobs on the mainboard which encode the computer's model and feature set.
My old laptop had like half the board unpopulated, with empty pads for GPU, GDDRs, regulators, mosfets and USB 3.0 controller. Looked like a donor PCB cannibalized for parts..
I had a weird HP all in one that I took apart that had a wireless receiver plugged into an internal usb port that was only accessible by disassembling the computer.
Sure is. The [Walmart Gateway Creator Series 15](https://www.notebookcheck.net/Walmart-Gateway-Creator-Series-15-Laptop-Review-GeForce-RTX-2060-For-Under-1000-USD.496254.0.html) uses the fully populated version of the board. Includes an RJ-45 jack and the 24pin socket behind it has an I/O processor for gigabit ethernet.
Pad layout and anchor points are different to the existing USB port, I think the poster who suggests Ethernet is right as compact RJ45 sockets have that diagonal 4x2 pin arrangement.
Could be an on board Ethernet port, there are 8 pads. The board likely doesn’t have the support chips soldered in so they removed the connector.
HDMI uses more connections so probably not that.
You would be sad to learn how much hardware exists in devices that are locked away due to product segmentation etc.
Its crazy the waste we make just for some investor to get just that bit more value.
Reminds me of that brief period when optical media was on the way out but laptops hadn't got thin enough yet. You'd get entire plastic blanks where DVD drives would have gone.
It's because these PCBs are used in different model laptops where one obviously offers 2 USBs and instead of printing 2 different PCBs, they just omit to solder 1 of the USBs on the same board and boom 2 different versions.
That's the poor model. They would have had an uber overpriced version with the slot usable and some more nifty things like a card reader and a coffee mug.
That's not USB, USB 2.0 is only 4 pins + the ground via the casing mounting per port.
8 pins and that footprint would be something else most likely low profile ethernet.
The board was probably used for several models for different reasons. If the unit is old, it may have been a low end USB port (like 1.1) used only for a mouse or whatever, that they didn't want to include in this particular model when USB is always fast.
Many people didn't realize on old machines they had a 1.1 (stupid slow) and 2.0 (slightly less stupid) so eliminating it was just easier, especially as USB became less necessary.
Gawer and Cusumano write about internal platforms - you build modular products you assemble later - so basically: this part is designed to be used in 5 products at once
That's Ethernet, not USB, though. You can tell by a) the pin number (8, USB is only 4) and b) the empty footprint in the back, which - when counting the pins again - is typical for a magnetics package. Also c) the slits in the PCB to hold the RJ45 connector to not rip it out on accident.
This isn't that uncommon. It's cheaper to design one board and disable unneeded features than it is to design different boards with the exact feature sets you need. Also, many cheaper USB headers tend to crap out at full load so it makes sense to keep one or two ports unused anyways to make sure that doesn't happen. The power lanes and bandwidth exist, but as long as they remain unused the header will never have to reach full load.
What's mildly infuriating is when a laptop has the USB 3.0 port capacity on the chipset, but it's not routed to the ports.
I had one such Windows 10 tablet, with only one USB 2.0 port, and when I'd plug in a USB 3.0 hard drive it would prompt me to connect it to a USB 3.0 port, since Windows was detecting the USB 3.0 controller on the chipset.
I have absolutely no idea why they didn't install a USB 3.0 port, the previous versions of this tablet all had USB 3.0.
They save 50c on the rj45 connector. A dollar on the io chip. A dollar on the labour or machine time/energy costs. Make 2 million of those laptops and the savings are not insignificant.
No it doesn't.
It has a spot for a USB port to have been added for a different model of laptop. It does not have an unused USB port.
They are not one and the same.
If you have a dual port IC connected to the PC, you can just solder on the physical connector (+/- control SMDs varying by IC).
It's not that difficult, I have done that.
There are plenty of reasons for a manufacturer to just not put the actual connector, even if it's just upselling 2 ports on the more expensive model.
See my previous comment.
None of what you said changes the fact that there isn't anything installed here, and a non-existent item isn't an existing feature that is not being used.
This is common with electronics and, in some cases, appliances purchased at Costco. One feature is omitted and although it saves the manufacturer very little money, it allows Costco to have a unique model number with nominally lower specifications that Costco can sell for 5% less without other retailers (BestBuy, Amazon) needing to match. "Everyone wins!"
Cost cutting in the part of the manufacturer instead of fabricating different boards for different chassis what they did is to reuse the board.
Pretty common, especially in HP laptops. You might find a fingerprint button in the laptop but actually it was just a plastic cap because the model didn't ship with fp sensor.
I wonder if this would be as simple as using a Dremel to cut the laptop case so you could insert the new USB, and then soldering on a new USB port to that set of pads?
How does one add "low quality" posts to a sub called "MILDLY interesting"?
This entire sub is for stuff that isn't super interesting, so all posts should be "low quality" by definition...
Not interesting at all..
.. what's interesting is there's many products that utilise a common foundation and tweak it in many different ways to put out different models or versions of itself all for the sake of cost cutting and efficiency.
Many laptops in a model range use the same motherboards and other PCB's which have different components soldered to them. Checking the insides of something called a 'Cloudbook' is interesting, you'll find there's no hard drive inside of it, but you can see where it would go in the upper models that support it.
Yes, it's not uncommon. Less expensive to use a preexisting board and not fully utilize it, rather than having to create a new one.
Kinda like how cars have "blank" buttons in them that you can't press. The top trim level of the car may use up all these buttons, but the manufacturer doesn't create a separate component that eliminates the unused buttons on lower level trims. Instead, they leave the buttons blank and just make them unable to be pressed.
2000 1" plastic square plugs is cheaper than a 2nd steering wheel design.
Especially when you know the costs of making a new mold for the plastic injection (a lot of $)
Don't forget the production loss of having to stop the machines, swop out the molds, run test injections, update all the robotics to the new part, and then do it all again next week, because the industry runs on a just in time production model.
Remember when cars had physical buttons? Good times.
I worked on some Chrysler years ago. It was a manual transmission, clutch and all, but it had push button gear shift.
That is wild and pointless, which is exactly what I would expect from Chrysler. Do you remember the model?
some 200's had them I think, they also had those rotary dial gear shifts which were on the dash. The worst.
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What drives me crazy is all these vehicles switching to shit like tiptronic. "No, you can't have a manual transmission. But we added these paddles so you can tell the automatic transmission to shift up on command, what more could you want??" Seems like its more the norm than the other way around. I've had multiple vehicles over the years with some crappy system I didn't use that worked like that. Plus similarly to AWD switches in some vehicles, those can be temperamental and I've seen cars where they basically got stuck in that faux manual mode.
I recently found out my car has cvt. And teptronic. So sure you could make it feel like a manual but it's worse in everyway.
I just bought a newest-gen Mazda 3, and it still has mostly physical buttons. Physical buttons for HVAC controls, physical buttons for driving mode selection, physical buttons to turn on and off traction control and driving assists. It still has Apple Carplay with a nice screen in the dash, but it's not even a touchscreen. I have a little wheel/selector in the center console to navigate the screen. Actual buttons weren't high on my priority list, but they were definitely a plus when I car shopping.
I love my Mazda6 but I hate that I can't open the trunk if the battery dies. Is it the same for the 3?
My Dodge Magnum is the same way. At least with a station wagon you can still access the cargo area pretty easily by folding the back seats. I keep a battery jump starter in the back but if you can't access the trunk with a dead battery they're small enough to fit under a seat or possibly even the glove box.
How often does your battery die?
It probably isn't often, but when it does happen, you'd probably like to open the trunk to get your jumper cables.
It actually is a touchscreen. You just cannot use the touch feature when you're going moving over 5-10 MPH. They further disincentivize using the touch screen by placing the screen just out of comfortable reach. Just my take here, but they probably realized that making it non touch entirely might be an issue if some random app in android auto/car play has a 'button' that does not play nice with their controls.
>It actually is a touchscreen. You just cannot use the touch feature when you're going moving over 5-10 MPH. Mine has no such feature. I'm literally sitting in my car in Park right now and nothing happens when I touch the screen.
Mine works as a touch screen in android auto. It does not work as one when navigating the default Mazda GUI.
Makes sense. My truck has buttons, but the touch screen is still critical for changing podcasts and shilling ads. Thankfully mine works in motion.
My wife has a CX-5 and it has the same radio/menu navigation "Commander" as Mazda calls it. The screen had touch ability but would send ghost commands as if someone touched it. A new OEM screen is over $200 and she never used the touch feature so I disconnected the cable to disable it completely. Now it's a regular screen.
I think we are potentially coming back round to them. Volkswagen seems to have indicated that they've realised how pissed off their move to touchscreen centric cars has made everyone and will be heading back to buttons. Pinch of salt, believe it when you see it etc etc...
Ford seems to have done so. My 23 Bronco has all physical buttons, I had a 21 F350 that was the same way.
>Volkswagen seems to have indicated that they've realised how pissed off their move to touchscreen centric cars has made everyone and will be heading back to buttons. It isn't even that, touchscreens are a risk compared to physical buttons. Touchscreens require you to remove your attention from the road to see where the button is while you can feel for a physical button without removing your attention from the road.
*It isn't even that, touchscreens are a risk compared to physical buttons.* I never said otherwise? That's a large part of why people are pissed off.
My car feels like the perfect mix of stuff. My climate control is all physical knobs (there's the option in the infotainment but I never use it). In the center console there's a small physical knob for volume, push it to mute, click left or right to seek or go to the next track. There's a larger knob that I can use to scroll through things in the infotainment easily as well. Stuff like changing the input source from my phone to radio. I rarely touch the touchscreen. It works really well for me. The infotainment system has a lot more useful information than what you get from older all physical cars while still having easy to use and index physical controls.
I think we are potentially coming back round to them. Volkswagen seems to have indicated that they've realised how pissed off their move to touchscreen centric cars has made everyone and will be heading back to buttons. Pinch of salt, believe it when you see it etc etc...
My car is a 2022 and still has tons of buttons. Its kind of overwhelming. I actually wish half if them had just been part of the touch screen, it would be less confusing.
Some Cars even have microphones and all that stuff installed but no phone calling, enabling it costs a few 100€ and they just put a code into your infotainment system to enable the existing feature
This is unfortunately pretty commonplace now for a lot of features in cars. You buy the whole car, but you can't use the whole car.
I don't actually have an issue with this, so long as I am getting a cheaper car as the tradeoff. Yes, it seems silly on the surface to pay for something that's already in the thing you bought, but if economies of scale mean the manufacturer can use some of the same parts and charge a higher price for models that have it enabled as standard, what do I care if the cheaper one I buy has it disabled and purchasable or simply doesn't have a mic in it at all - so long as the price is identical in both scenarios? Subscriptions for car features though? No. Fuck that shit.
The issue is whether it's actually cheaper though rather than just not even more expensive
I purchased a program and dongle combo that allows me into any car's system and allows me to enable/disable the different options. For instance, on my Mazda 10, I was able to change the shift points to be more in line with what they should be to get the best gas mileage and performance out of it.
I mean BMW made it worse with their subscription heating seat but it’s been a thing for a while. My moms car is like that (2015 golf 7)
We call those blanks "poverty buttons".
Haha, I had definitely heard that before, but I wasn't sure if it was well known enough to mention.
MG-Rover actually had different panels on the Rover 75 / MG ZT. The top trim specced with all the options would have five buttons, the lowest had none, so they had six different versions (0, 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 holes). And of course, all those panels were available in a selection of colours matching your dashboard. Even in poverty spec there were no blanking covers to be seen.
Yeah those aren't buttons. Just blank covers.
Same fuse panels too. Sometimes the wires in the harness will also be there and you can pull the parts from an upgraded model and install them. I was thinking about installing power windows on my Kia. Everything is there except the buttons, fuse, and motor assembly.
I have a chest freezer with two toggle switches that don't do anything. I assume reusing the power/control module was cheaper than buying (or setting up tooling for) a separate module without the buttons.
It's also possible it wouldn't work if you soldered one on. Just because the board has the input doesn't mean the chipset or bridge have the functionality.
The worst is the "navigation packages" that really just have software lockouts.
Or for very specific options most don’t want.
Many cars that don't come with heated seats as standard still have everything in the seats to make them work, the only thing that's missing is the buttons and maybe part of the wiring harness but usually it's there. Still people went mad when Tesla started giving people that bought a lower trim car that didn't have heated seats as standard the option to buy it because they could add it in later with software.
And to be fair, it makes it nice when someone is installing modifications; ie A Lightbar or something. Gives a spot for the button to go, instead of having to cut through somewhere, or create a dodgy button out of the side of somewhere.
Yep Cathode Ray Dude has several videos tearing down random computers and he comes across these pretty commonly (great channel btw).
I've seen tons of cheap garbage laptops like these while working as a tech. I've seen: Missing USB Missing RJ45 (Which is what we have here) Traces for RAM chips Empty space where a GPU and it's VRAM are on another model A space in the case for an optical drive, filled in with plastic, sometimes the SATA port was there. A space for 2.5" drives, again, both with and without a port. M.2 traces, once I've seen a whole port, but it was disabled in bios, no way to enable it, short of flashing the bios I guess. Random missing chips. Empty connectors for stuff like touchscreen, keyboard backlight. Sometimes the connector is there, fully functional, but nothing to plug into it. Sometimes you could even see on the chassis where the port was supposed to be. Some 15" laptops I've seen could fit in an 11" chassis given how little was actually there. A small board with no upgradability or repairability for that matter, a spicy pillow in grey pouch form, a weirdly long ribbon cable soldered to both the mobo and a daughter board with 2 USB and 1 jack, and wires thinner than your hair for the 2W speakers. Nothing else. Now, that's common in the industry, but it's especially common on cheaper laptops, because what you see in those is the most barebone board possible for that model. Sometimes the manufacturer doesn't bother to redesign the chassis for a few generation and so you get stuff like the optical and 2.5" drive space filled with plastic.
The extra space for a HD has been common since the 90s. They would leave the space for an expansion, similar to a desktop. Only issue was you would have to spend hours disassembling and reassembling them. It was easier to just add an external and usually much cheaper since 3.5" were more common
Yeah, but now that space is filled in with plastic, you can't even put an HD there anymore, it's a remnant of an older case design they reused to save even more money. Lenovo has that thing on some older thinkpad (and by older I mean 7th/8th gen, things like that) where there's an M.2 on the board and a 2.5" drive bay that has the caddy, but no drive and no cable. There's two version of that cable, either you can put in a SATA drive, or an NVMe/SATA M.2 drive. The connector is there, so if you buy the missing hardware, you can add storage pretty easily.
True. I have worked on products where the only difference between the cheap model and the expensive one was a bit flipped in software. Same exact device. When manufacturing there is an obsession with making the process as simple as possible to manage, just having multiple SKUs and different parts could confuse the guys working on the assembly line, so it all has to be foolproof.
Tesla and the "subscription fee" for self driving!
Yeah, in the business we call this a “stuff option”
…add a port bro
My last pre built PC had a labeled space for an AGP slot. I felt so ripped off I vowed to build my next one. By then PCIE was a thing and I made damn sure I had one.
I think there is a lot more nuance to it. Often, its literally cheaper manufacturing wise to just give everyone the best thing, and only for reasons of capitalism and eternal non stop growth do we have people suffer through low end hardware.
A fun DIY project
I wonder if it needs something else rather then USB port
Yeah, the chance of an "unsoldered" controller chip are high here. But not necessarily!
USB doesn't have controllers (outside the SoC or chipset) anymore, especially USB2.0. It'll be for an optional port (ports are in pairs in USB2.0), perhaps if the internal webcam or bluetooth wasn't fitted. I/O boards broken out like this are common between a lot of models, it could even be that this model has all the wires run and just needs the port soldering down. If so, C1905 would need to be added.
> USB doesn't have controllers (outside the SoC or chipset) anymore, especially USB2.0. Depends on the SoC; a lot of devices don't have USB2.0 HS (or faster) PHYs on die and rely on external PHY chips connected via ULPI. Even so, the missing part appears to be ethernet and the missing IC is the magnetics for it. https://totallaptopsolutions.com/products/dbpgk5mpf5-0n10-usb-audio-pc-board-w-cable-gwtn156-2bk-grade-a-compatible-with-gateway
Don't be so pedantic... USB DOES have hubs, its definitely a missing chip there it may be a USB isolator or something though but it clearly part of the USB circuit.
Every usb has controllers and this is not a usb, this is ethernet, also missing "chip" is ethernet coils
wait...didn't you used to make Vinesauce compilations on YouTube?
Not since about 2018, and even then it was scarce. Basically yes, but it's been over longer than it was active at this point.
I got CaptainSouthbird jump scared on reddit oh no
Yes, like that missing chip above it.
[seems like the xbox one X has NVMe solder pads and even the stamped metal casing as a place for the NVMe.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EpFKDzmMnao) >!didn't work out!<
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There are multiple layers
Very common. Sometimes you'll find whole footprints for GPUs and VRAM on the mainboard. They reuse the same PCB for several models with different features to lower design cost. You might be able to add the components. Often you'll find a grid of solder blobs on the mainboard which encode the computer's model and feature set.
My old laptop had like half the board unpopulated, with empty pads for GPU, GDDRs, regulators, mosfets and USB 3.0 controller. Looked like a donor PCB cannibalized for parts..
Perfect for adding an internal Logitech unifying receiver
I had a weird HP all in one that I took apart that had a wireless receiver plugged into an internal usb port that was only accessible by disassembling the computer.
I worked on those a few times. Really fucking annoying trying to get at that receiver…
Still crazy that they don't have a Usb C version
That's looks to be a RJ45 connector the foot print behind looks like the magnetics for it.
It's indeed a slim RJ45 connector, based on other reference photos of the board.
Sure is. The [Walmart Gateway Creator Series 15](https://www.notebookcheck.net/Walmart-Gateway-Creator-Series-15-Laptop-Review-GeForce-RTX-2060-For-Under-1000-USD.496254.0.html) uses the fully populated version of the board. Includes an RJ-45 jack and the 24pin socket behind it has an I/O processor for gigabit ethernet.
The 8 pin facing out is definitely RJ45. I'm pretty sure the 24 pin in the back is USBc though
It’s too big for that. It’s for something like this: https://www.taoglas.com/product/tm7008anl-lan-transformer-10g-base-t-poe/
Ahhh you're right. That makes way more sense
I was thinking an HDMI port as the board says Audio_V1.
Not enough pins and I don’t think they even come as through hole connectors.
You're absolutely right. There are only 8 on that side of the board.
Very common. Low end desktop motherboards are a quarter empty spots of controllers and ports.
Pad layout and anchor points are different to the existing USB port, I think the poster who suggests Ethernet is right as compact RJ45 sockets have that diagonal 4x2 pin arrangement.
Not even soldered. It's super common for manufacturers to reuse existing components such as boards.
Could be an on board Ethernet port, there are 8 pads. The board likely doesn’t have the support chips soldered in so they removed the connector. HDMI uses more connections so probably not that.
That's for an rj45 port. You can't use it without the accompanying io chip.
That’s not a USB port.
Right, surprised no one else here has said this. That is a slot where a USB port might go, but most likely is for RJ45 ethernet
Several people have said something....in comments that are hours older than yours.
That actually looks like an ethernet jack
/r/titlegore
One board design cheaper than two.
I used to love the ones that were functional but only accessible from the inside. Great spot for a dongle to live forever
Actually looks more like an RJ45...
This is rj-45, not needed in this version
You would be sad to learn how much hardware exists in devices that are locked away due to product segmentation etc. Its crazy the waste we make just for some investor to get just that bit more value.
Reminds me of that brief period when optical media was on the way out but laptops hadn't got thin enough yet. You'd get entire plastic blanks where DVD drives would have gone.
Dell would use those slots for a slide-in battery.
No, your laptop doesn't have an unused one. It has a spot where one might have gone.
Tell me that doesn’t look like a lil DJ stand
It's because these PCBs are used in different model laptops where one obviously offers 2 USBs and instead of printing 2 different PCBs, they just omit to solder 1 of the USBs on the same board and boom 2 different versions.
That's the poor model. They would have had an uber overpriced version with the slot usable and some more nifty things like a card reader and a coffee mug.
Must smash with tiny rock to fix, grognor will do for you for five fish
That's not USB, USB 2.0 is only 4 pins + the ground via the casing mounting per port. 8 pins and that footprint would be something else most likely low profile ethernet.
My fatigued brain saw this and thought it was a new shape for an OREO box.
The board was probably used for several models for different reasons. If the unit is old, it may have been a low end USB port (like 1.1) used only for a mouse or whatever, that they didn't want to include in this particular model when USB is always fast. Many people didn't realize on old machines they had a 1.1 (stupid slow) and 2.0 (slightly less stupid) so eliminating it was just easier, especially as USB became less necessary.
For WiFi of the old school variety.
No there's no unused port, simply the solder connections are present on the motherboard. A port means something can be plugged it to it, this is not.
Gawer and Cusumano write about internal platforms - you build modular products you assemble later - so basically: this part is designed to be used in 5 products at once
That's Ethernet, not USB, though. You can tell by a) the pin number (8, USB is only 4) and b) the empty footprint in the back, which - when counting the pins again - is typical for a magnetics package. Also c) the slits in the PCB to hold the RJ45 connector to not rip it out on accident.
Often it’s less expensive to make one type of board and then vary the cases. They did this with calculators.
This isn't that uncommon. It's cheaper to design one board and disable unneeded features than it is to design different boards with the exact feature sets you need. Also, many cheaper USB headers tend to crap out at full load so it makes sense to keep one or two ports unused anyways to make sure that doesn't happen. The power lanes and bandwidth exist, but as long as they remain unused the header will never have to reach full load.
Pretty common with computers.
*unpaid
Looks like a placeholder to use the same board for something else.
U didn’t pay enough
It could be HDMI basing it on [this socket](https://images.app.goo.gl/5CCNsw8vXUeGXzDZA) that match the 4 square points in the board.
Made in china? I think its something like secret achivement in steam, only for guys who realy worthy.
I don’t think you can get any more mild than this
just means you picked the model that had 1 not 2 just like cars having wires for extra things some not even for your car
If you and someone else around the world connect to the port at the same time something magical will happen.
What am I supposed to be looking at here? I only see the one port, and it looks usable
Hot glue a usb port on there and try it out 🤣
What's mildly infuriating is when a laptop has the USB 3.0 port capacity on the chipset, but it's not routed to the ports. I had one such Windows 10 tablet, with only one USB 2.0 port, and when I'd plug in a USB 3.0 hard drive it would prompt me to connect it to a USB 3.0 port, since Windows was detecting the USB 3.0 controller on the chipset. I have absolutely no idea why they didn't install a USB 3.0 port, the previous versions of this tablet all had USB 3.0.
Mine has an unpopulated m.2 slot, I Hate that it's there, teasing me
Heavily modify or buy a usb extender
They save 50c on the rj45 connector. A dollar on the io chip. A dollar on the labour or machine time/energy costs. Make 2 million of those laptops and the savings are not insignificant.
Buy a usb-c with headers, a soldering iron, some solder and a Dremel, make your own port
It's place for RJ45 (LAN) connector, not for USB.
people used to use those for bluetooth adapters back when laptops didn't commonly have bluetooth.
No it doesn't. It has a spot for a USB port to have been added for a different model of laptop. It does not have an unused USB port. They are not one and the same.
Exactly this. The board may be missing more components than just the connector so soldering on a new connector may not make it magically work.
It is kind of like when you buy a low model car and it has plastic covering where all the buttons would have been.
Right. I wouldn't consider that an "unused button", I consider that a spot where a button could have gone.
Most USB ICs are dual port, because they have higher margins for USB hubs and are cheaper. In this case, the empty space is for a slim RJ45 connector.
Okay? This still doesn't have one installed that is going unused...
If you have a dual port IC connected to the PC, you can just solder on the physical connector (+/- control SMDs varying by IC). It's not that difficult, I have done that. There are plenty of reasons for a manufacturer to just not put the actual connector, even if it's just upselling 2 ports on the more expensive model.
See my previous comment. None of what you said changes the fact that there isn't anything installed here, and a non-existent item isn't an existing feature that is not being used.
So your definition of "unused" just differs from everyone else's. There isn't anything more to say then.
I think it's more my definition of "port".
This is common with electronics and, in some cases, appliances purchased at Costco. One feature is omitted and although it saves the manufacturer very little money, it allows Costco to have a unique model number with nominally lower specifications that Costco can sell for 5% less without other retailers (BestBuy, Amazon) needing to match. "Everyone wins!"
Cost cutting in the part of the manufacturer instead of fabricating different boards for different chassis what they did is to reuse the board. Pretty common, especially in HP laptops. You might find a fingerprint button in the laptop but actually it was just a plastic cap because the model didn't ship with fp sensor.
“Expandable“
I wonder if this would be as simple as using a Dremel to cut the laptop case so you could insert the new USB, and then soldering on a new USB port to that set of pads?
I wouldn't call it 'simple', but I bet it would work.
8 pins, missing an IC, looks like it is missing a network port.
For a second there I thought that PCB was a repurposed credit card.
What brand is it by the way?
Ok?
r/notinteresting
But is it r/mildlyinteresting?
Maybe to you but not to me
Dont know why you’re downvoted. Remove post for low quality effort
How does one add "low quality" posts to a sub called "MILDLY interesting"? This entire sub is for stuff that isn't super interesting, so all posts should be "low quality" by definition...
Nah, that .30 cent part is for the $400 more *delluxe* model.
Not interesting at all.. .. what's interesting is there's many products that utilise a common foundation and tweak it in many different ways to put out different models or versions of itself all for the sake of cost cutting and efficiency. Many laptops in a model range use the same motherboards and other PCB's which have different components soldered to them. Checking the insides of something called a 'Cloudbook' is interesting, you'll find there's no hard drive inside of it, but you can see where it would go in the upper models that support it.