A hobbyist going by mkopec turned an approximately $45 Cable Matters USB-C hub into a working Nintendo Switch 2 dock, using only about 540 bytes of code to mod the firmware. That mod lets the hub masquerade as an official dock, as mkopec detailed in a blog post.
The edited firmware replies to Nintendo’s vendor messages and returns the same identity as the official dock, and makes TV mode work, which was not the case with the hub’s stock firmware. A separate fix with minor firmware rewriting also corrects washed-out HDR over HDMI, a nice bonus.
The modder, who writes that “Nintendo went in a proprietary direction (as they so often do),” decided to modify the hub’s firmware to make a working travel dock, as Nintendo’s official dock can be bulky. Unlocking the additional functionality did not come with a noticeable cost, as the hub “still works normally with my PC and my phone.” Grabbing an off-the-shelf USB-C hub and turning it into something more is quite the trick.
The stock hub has no problem charging the console, but it shows no picture, even though it negotiates both power and DisplayPort Alt Mode. Capturing the official Switch 2 dock’s traffic with a USB Power Delivery (USB-PD) sniffer, the modder found that it advertises two Standard or Vendor IDs: one for DisplayPort and one for Nintendo’s own mode.
The console enters Nintendo’s mode first, then DisplayPort, and, once DisplayPort is configured, it sends Nintendo’s vendor messages.
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