I had written an article about a POE-USB adapter from Ubiquiti just a few months ago in which I was excited to have an adapter in hand for the first time that would allow me to use POE power for smaller USB devices, and I was looking forward to seeing more of them – for devices with more power needs.
A reader of the blog brought to my attention that the company Microchip now sells a Power Delivery power supply that can do just that: Up to 60W Power Delivery for USB-C. Instantorder.
Nice side effect, as I read in the product description was: The device is also a USB 2.0 network card. A dream come true. I get my mobile devices while they hang on the power in the LAN and relieve the Wlan for this time.
The Powerbrick arrived after a few days and makes a good impression. Metal casing and screwable USB-C port.
I connected the device directly to my MicroTik Netpower P16 switch and attached the Macbook Pro.
Unfortunately, it turned out that the maximum power output that my Macbook got was a maximum of 24W and that with an almost empty battery and without “optimized charging”. That is unfortunately not even enough to charge the battery, but only for operation.
As it turned out, the POE-USB-PD60 did not register as a USB network card on my Mac either. A quick check of the manual showed that the LAN7800 chip requires a driver installation for MacOS devices. Aha, great. Driver installed but…. nothing.
I have written to Microchip support but have not yet received a reply.
Unfortunately, the device is going back.