AX88179 is the world's first USB 3.0 to Gigabit Ethernet controller which integrates USB 3.0 PHY and 10/100/1000Mbps Gigabit Ethernet MAC/PHY in a single chip. The AX88179 is the latest addition to ASIX's USB-to-LAN product portfolio, providing a small form factor solution and plug-and-play usability, enabling embedded system designers to deliver Gigabit Ethernet connectivity while leveraging the growth and speed of USB 3.0 SuperSpeed technology.
The AX88179 is a high performance and highly integrated ASIC which enables a low cost, small form factor, and simple plug-and-play Gigabit Ethernet network connection capability for desktops, notebook PCs, ultrabooks, cradles/port replicators/docking stations, game consoles, digital-home appliances, and any embedded system using a standard USB port. Features

● Single chip USB 3.0 to 10/100/1000M Gigabit Ethernet controller with Energy Efficient Ethernet (EEE) base on digital signal processing (DSP) technology with low dissipation
● USB Device Controller
-- Integrates on-chip USB 3.0 PHY and controller compliant to USB Spec 3.0, 2.0 and 1.1
-- Supports all USB 3.0 power saving modes (U0, U1, U2, and U3)
-- Supports USB Super/High/Full Speed modes with Bus-power or Self-power device auto-detect capability
-- High performance packet transfer rate over USB bus using proprietary burst transfer mechanism (US Patent Approval)
● Gigabit Ethernet Controller
-- Supports IEEE 802.3az (Energy Efficient Ethernet)
-- IEEE 802.3, 802.3u and 802.3ab compatible
-- Integrates 10/100/1000Mbps Gigabit Ethernet MAC/PHY
-- Supports dynamic cable length detection and dynamic power adjustment Green Ethernet (Gigabit mode only)
-- Supports parallel detection and automatic polarity correction
-- Supports crossover detection and auto- correction
-- Supports IPv4/IPv6 packet Checksum Offload Engine (COE) to reduce CPU loading, including IPv4 IP/TCP/UDP/ICMP/IGMP & IPv6 TCP/UDP/ICMPv6 checksum check & generation
-- Supports TCP Large Send Offload V1
-- Supports full duplex operation with IEEE 802.3x flow control and half duplex operation with back-pressure flow control
-- Supports IEEE 802.1P Layer 2 Priority Encoding and Decoding
-- Supports IEEE 802.1Q VLAN tagging and 2 VLAN ID filtering; received VLAN Tag (4 bytes) can be stripped off or preserved
-- Supports Jumbo frame up to 4KB
-- PHY loop-back diagnostic capability
● Support Wake-on-LAN Function
-- Supports suspend mode and remote wakeup via link-change, Magic Packet, Microsoft Wakeup Frame and external wakeup pin
-- Supports Bonjour wake-on-demand
● Advanced Power Management Features
-- Supports power management offload (ARP & NS)
-- Supports dynamic power management to reduce power dissipation during idle or light traffic
-- Supports AutoDetach power saving
-- Supports advanced link down power saving when Ethernet cable is unplugged
● Supports optional serial EEPROM (93c56/66) for storing USB Descriptors, Node-ID, etc.
● Supports embedded eFuse (64-byte) to store USB Device Descriptors, Node-ID, etc to save external EEPROM
● Supports automatic loading of USB Device Descriptors, Node-ID, etc. from embedded eFuse or external EEPROM after power-on initialization
● Single 25MHz clock input from either crystal or oscillator source
● Integrates on-chip power-on reset circuit
● Integrates pipelined RISC (System on a Chip, SoC) for handling protocol and control functions
● 68-pin QFN 8mm x 8mm RoHS/REACH compliant package
● Operating over 0°C to 70°C temperature rang

All ASIX's AX88179 standard drivers are qualified with ASIX's AX88179 demo board with AX88179 default Vendor ID (0B95h) and Product ID (1790h). Some of AX88179 manufacturers have their own Vendor ID and Product ID on their AX88179 applications. In this case, ASIX's AX88179 standard drivers will not work with your AX88179 device. Please contact the technical support of your AX88179 device manufacturer to obtain a proper driver.

No, it could not be done by end users. To install AX88179 Linux driver on your Android tablet PC, you have to recompile AX88179 Linux driver source on your target Android tablet platform and then you can install the compiled AX88179 Linux driver on your Android platform. It can only be done by the manufacturer of your Android tablet PC. Please contact the support guys of your Android platform manufacturer for further support if necessary.

Please try to un-install the existing installed AX88179 driver firstly and then re-install the latest AX88179 macOS driver to improve this kind of issue.
For macOS 10.13 or above systems, please double check if you have set the "Allow apps downloaded from" option on the ”Security & Privacy” console to "App Store and identifier developers" to allow loading the newly-installed third-party kernel extensions (KEXTs).

No, the AX88179 already supports available device drivers for most of operating systems such as Windows 10/8.x/7, Linux, Mac OSX, WinCE/Mobile, etc. Please visit AX88179 Driver Download web page for details. For some special OS supporting requirements, please contact ASIX's sales ([email protected]) for further support.

The AX88179 supports a 64-byte eFuse that is a one-time programming ROM for an alternate solution to store the required hardware configuration data in production. We strongly suggest customers to reserve the EEPROM location on AX88179 PCB board for flexible designs even if you plan to use the AX88179 eFuse for hardware configuration. Please refer to AX88179 EEPROM User Guide for details.

AX88179 supports some default settings inside chip hardware to enable it to communicate with USB host controller during enumeration when the AX88179 EEPROM is blank (prior to being programmed). The default settings inside chip facilitate users to update the EEPROM contents through a Windows PC during R&D validation process or program a blank EEPROM or eFuse during manufacturing process.
ASIX Electronics provides Windows/Linux SROM programming tools for users to easily program AX88179 EEPROM or eFuse on a typical Windows/Linux platforms. These AX88179 SROM programming tools support to customize the MAC address, Serial Number, Vendor ID and Product ID, etc. for AX88179 based application systems in mass production.
Alternatively, users can pre-program the blank EEPROM on a 3rd Party Universal Programmer before soldering the EEPROM onto the AX88179 application device. You MUST assign a unique MAC address in the EEPROM for every AX88179 device.
Please refer to AX88179 EEPROM User Guide for more detailed EEPROM/eFuse design notes.

The answers to above questions really depend on user's product applications and target market, which can be different on individual cases. Below gives customers some general guidelines about whether one can use ASIX's VID/PID or one should better register its own one with USB-IF.
1.Case where it is OK to use ASIX Electronics's VID (0B95h) and PID (1790h):
You may be able to use ASIX Electronics' VID and PID when your AX88179 based application system can simply work with AX88179 standard drivers provided by ASIX without any modification and you don't have any concern from business and product marketing perspective to use the same VID and PID on your products as ASIX's other customers who are also using ASIX's VID and PID. ASIX Electronics would like to request customers to inform ASIX sales staffs by sending us email at [email protected] beforehand if you would like to use ASIX Electronics VID and PID for your products.
2.Cases requiring you to use your own VID and PID
(1) Your AX88179 based application systems can't work directly with AX88179 standard drivers which ASIX Electronics release on its web site and your target application system (such as USB dongle or docking station) may allow your end customers to update the standalone AX88179 driver by themselves after sales. In that case, you MUST assign your own unique VID and PID for your AX88179 based devices.
(2) For brand name products, you probably don't want your AX88179 based devices to become compatible with other company's AX88179 based devices. In this case, you should consider assigning your own unique VID and PID for your AX88179 based devices.
You can register your own VID from USB Implementers Forum, Inc. and define the PID based on your company rules.

You must first have an OUI or an IAB, to which you then append 24 or 12 bits respectively, in a way that makes the resulting 48-bit number unique, i.e., your 24 or 12 bits must be unique within your organization, which will require coordination among all the users of your organization's OUI or IAB. Please visit the IEEE-SA web site for details.

No, it depends on the real requirement of your AX88179 target application. If users need to install more than one AX88179 based devices on your target application, you should assign a different serial number in the EEPROM for every AX88179 device.
If your target application always uses one AX88179 device, you can consider assigning the same serial number in the EEPROM for every AX88179 device for easy maintenance in mass production, especially if you plan to use a Windows PC to test AX88179 based devices repeatedly during mass production test.

Windows 7 32-bit/64-bit HLK/WHCK drivers setup program

For x86/x64 CPU platform, WHCK certified

Version
3.0.6.0

Release Date
2018-02-09

File Size
8.9 MB

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