How to get USB file transfer working on Oreo 8.1?

I always used to transfer files between my laptop and Nexus 5X phone. Upon connecting the USB cable, there used to be a notification thingy on my phone showing USB options, which was default on 'Charging' and then when changing that to File Transfer, I could transfer files.

I recently had to reset my phone and now that I have a new, freshly installed Oreo 8.1.0 environment, this USB notification does not appear anymore. And the device does not show up on my laptop at all.

While searching for a solution I came across these suggestions which I already tried:

• Enabling developer mode on Android (clicking 7x on Build number in About).


• In developer options, enable and disable USB debugging.


• Clearing the cache and data storage for the 'External storage' and 'Media storage' apps, and rebooting my phone, and wait for a while.


• In developer options, there is something called "Select USB configuration" which is on "MTP (Media Transfer Protocol)". Changed that to "Charging" or "PTP (Picture Transfer Protocol)" and back.

None of these helped, unfortunately. Any hints?

Note that the cable is fine. It works OK on other phones, and upon connecting my phone to my laptop, it does show the charging indicator in the battery icon. It's just the USB notification and file transfer related options that are no longer there.