ASUS ThunderboltEX 3-TR Expansion Card for Z490 (Intel 10th Gen CPUs)motherboard (PCIe 3.0 x4 interface, 2 x Thunderbolt™ 3 USB Type-C® ports with 100w USB quick charge, 2 x mini DisplayPort IN ports)

Research! Make sure this adapter is compatible with your motherboard! Make sure your motherboard has the required thunderbolt header pins. You will also need an available PCIe 3.0 x4 (or x8/x16) expansion slot. You will also need a 6pin power connector available for this adapter.Hardware Installation: Insert the adapter into the PCIe x4 expansion slot. The card may be much smaller than the expansion slot and that's OK. Connect the USB 2.0 header pin to your motherboard. Do the same for the Thunderbolt header cable. The pins are unique so you can't connect these incorrectly. Connect the 6-pin power connect to the adapter. Now, outside the case, connect the mini DP cable to PORT#1 of the Thunderbolt adapter. Connect the other end to your graphics card display port. Do the same for the second mini DP, even if you will only be outputting to a single monitor. Finally, connect a Thunderbolt/USB-C cable to PORT#1 of the adapter to your external monitor.Software Installation: I do not have a DVD drive so I wasn't able to install the drivers with the provided disc. That ended up not being a problem. The ASUS boot logo appeared before Windows got to the login screen. I did install the drivers from the ASUS support site.Usage: The LG Ultrafine display from Apple has absolutely no buttons at all, no power or OSD. Fortunately, it just worked. With the ASUS Thunderbolt 3 the LG Ultrafine display goes up to 5k (5120x2880) if you connect the cable after you boot your PC. Otherwise you will boot at 3840x2160@60HZ. The four USB-C ports on the monitor are not recognized by Windows, there's probably a setting in BIOS I need to adjust and will update my review if I am able to fix it. I don't consider this a problem with the ASUS thunderbolt adapter since this display is designed specifically for Apple hardware.Overall I'm very pleased that this adapter allows me to connect to this display. Installation was quick and easy.

I purchased (and returned) this card because it is specifically supposed to work with the Asus Prime Z-490A motherboard which I have in one of my systems. This is for a new music studio pc which needs to connect Thunderbolt 3 to a Focusrite Red 16Line - a top of the line recording studio interface.For all my trying of everything - it never saw the device, with all the relevant drivers and software installed, and header connected.In (a small amount of) fairness, I tried the Gigabyte TB3 PCI card and it didn't see the device either.Finally I installed the Gigabyte in my other machine for gaming/work and it saw the device. This is a three year old Asrock motherboard, which thankfully has TB support. Saw the Focusrite and synced right away (with relevant software installed)But it doesn't have the very specific Asus TB header on it that this Asus card needs so I didn't try this card on the older PC. What then ensued was days of switching my two PCs (one is upstairs the other is downstairs in the studio) around from their two now opposite purposes.Bottom line = The "Asus ThunderboltEX 3-TR Expansion Card for Z490" absolutely did NOT WORK for that EXACT motherboard!Maybe it works for displays or connecting your apple phone but I was only able to achieve my intended result with older hardware and a different PCI card for my specialized needs.I suspect it came down to this type of card needs a PCIx4 slot specifically - and I have the Gigabyte card plugged in to that type of slot on my older system (with the Asrock) which became my studio system. That board also has the more standard TB header that is compatible with the Gigabyte. The Asus mobo has the right TB header for the Asus TB card but not a PCIx4 slot.Still, it bears repeating = The "Asus ThunderboltEX 3-TR Expansion Card for Z490" absolutely did NOT WORK for that EXACT motherboard!

This card was difficult to get working.My system would boot with it in the second slot but would freeze up in the log in menu.So I switch my GPU and this card and it worked fine.My GPU is a GTX 1060 so it doesn't need the support for PCIe4 x16, but if I ever upgrade I will have to figure this problem out.(Possibly a motherboard bios update would fix this????)The card gives me the full thunderbolt 3 capabilities.

A few very important things to note when purchasing this. This works really well for what I need. I'm using the B550-E Motherboard.This will NOT allow you to use USB-C Thunderbolt 3 displays. It WILL allow you to connect to a monitor using mini-display ports.First. Install the firmware before installing the card. Not toally necessary, because it worked the other way around for me. But another user says that corrected their install problem.Second, install the card.Third. In BIOS, this is VERY important, you have to SEARCH for "thunderbolt" and enable all the settings. I couldn't find it by clicking around the menu. I actually had to type it into the search bar.After all of those steps, restart your comp and you should be good to go!

I stupidly bought a new system with an Asus motherboard that did not have a Thunderbolt, USB Type-C connection. After searching online, I found this card that adds this port. My motherboard (Asus Prime Z490-P) was on the compatibility list and installed easily. On startup, enter your BIOS and go to advanced settings and enable Thunderbolt support. Started windows and worked perfectly with my Logitech Streamcam (USB-C only connection). You have the option to plug a power connector to the card if your Thunderbolt device needs power or can be charged by this connection. You can hook up the card without the power connection if you do not require it like me.