USB 2.0 question

[doofus125]

Ok, I have 6 usb 2.0 ports in my computer (4 in back, 2 in front), 3 of them are used by my external drive enclosures (a hard drive, a zip drive, and a cd burner)......1 port is my printer........1 of the two on the front has my battery backup, and the other one is empty for now, but I use it for my thumbdrive......

At some point down the road I'm going to be adding a scanner and a couple other things that will take a usb port.....

my question is this, if I plug my 3 external drives and my printer into a usb 2.0 hub, will there be any loss in speed or anything? can I plug all of those into 1 usb 2.0 hub or doesn't it matter?

Thanks,

Bill

 

[Deacon]

A USB Hub is just that...there shouldn't be any lost of speed or data transfer when going through a HUB. As long as you have a 2.0 HUB connected to your 2.0 Port then you should be fine.

 

[mrgrandyman]

Be sure to purchase a name brand hub that clearly indicates that it meets the USB 2.0 spec. Likely that you won't find one that doesn't meet the spec but I bet there are some around online or something. Just something to be aware of.

Adam

 

[4thwatcher]

i dont think there would be a loss in speed or quality should additional usb hubs (either internal or external) be connected to your pc. like yours, got 6 usb ports working in my pc and one port is usb hubs, all being used .. i dont feel any speed or quality deterioration. my powersupply is 450 watts!

 

[Stryper]

cant you piggy back your external hard drives?

i have 2 firewire ports and 1 usb 2.0 port on my firewire drive.

can you only piggy back using firewire?

 

[doofus125]

cant you piggy back your external hard drives?

i have 2 firewire ports and 1 usb 2.0 port on my firewire drive.

can you only piggy back using firewire?

no, these are specifically usb 2.0, there is just the 1 plug in the back and I'd still need a hub....these are actually external drive enclosures with individual 50 watt power supplys that I installed regular internal drives into (hard drive, zip, cd-rw) and being I didn't want to spend alot of money I got the usb 2.0 kits being I don't have any firewire ports on my computer and really don't have a need for them at this point.....

Thanks,

Bill

 

[trunks2k]

If you are using the hardrives at the same time, you'll most likely see a decrease in performance because all the data being transfered is forced over one bus, instead of being divided among several. But I highly doubt that you will be actually transferring data between the multiple hard drives all at once all too often, so you should be fine.

 

[doofus125]

If you are using the hardrives at the same time, you'll most likely see a decrease in performance because all the data being transfered is forced over one bus, instead of being divided among several. But I highly doubt that you will be actually transferring data between the multiple hard drives all at once all too often, so you should be fine.

See, that was my question, lol......in other words I don't want to go with a hub because I transfter stuff from hard drive to zip and from hard drive to cd-r and they are all the external usb 2.0 drive kits.........I'll just put in another card even thought it's my last pci slot, question answered thank you for all of your help.....

 

[seebs]

It depends a lot on your hardware. Most systems actually have all of their ports on a single internal hub anyway, so it makes no difference. Actually, you could see a measurable (but TINY) speed loss from a hub. I would tend to bundle lower-speed things (say, printer/scanner/zip) on a hub just out of caution.