Generic USB 2.0 hub showing up as USB 1.1

In article <e6Lzo3ATIHA.280@TK2MSFTNGP03.phx.gbl>,
comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.chips, VanguardLH@mail.invalid says...
> "Yousuf Khan" wrote in message
> news:0uSdnbXQJLm6LOXa4p2dnAA@giganews.com...

<snip>

> > I've even tried a different cable as suggested elsewhere in this
> > thread. It didn't help. However, as I said before, going into Linux
> > and then rebooting into Windows fixes it for some inexplicable
> > reason. So far this trick has worked 100% reliably.
>
>
> Sounds like it is time to toss the flaky old USB hub and get an new
> one for $7.

I was thinking the same thing, but it sounded too simple. ;-) I
found one model I liked (seven-ports, two on top) so bought a
spare, just in case. I can't even buy the wall wart that came with
it for $7.

--
Keith

VanguardLH wrote:
> Sounds like it is time to toss the flaky old USB hub and get an new one
> for $7.

$7? Where can you get it for $7?

Yousuf Khan

"krw" wrote in message
news:MPG.21e38d03dbbc123b9897eb@news.individual.ne t...
>
>> Vanguard said:
>> Sounds like it is time to toss the flaky old USB hub and get an new
>> one for $7.
>
> I was thinking the same thing, but it sounded too simple. ;-) I
> found one model I liked (seven-ports, two on top) so bought a
> spare, just in case. I can't even buy the wall wart that came with
> it for $7.

There are usually price breaks for products after which the rise in
price is almost logarithmic. 4-port USB hubs are most common and
probably where you get the best price break per port. Of course,
popular branding will cost you.

A self-powered 4-port USB hub (which obviously includes the power
adapter) starts at $5 (and Iogear is an okay brand). A 7-port USB hub
(for a brand that I've heard of) runs about $20. It's just like CPUs:
you'll find a sweet price break afterwhich the jumps in price far
outstrips the meager increase in speed.

Sounds like you're trying to replace both USB hubs with one.

"Yousuf Khan" wrote in message
news:VZGdnbESDeVeSuTaRVn_vwA@giganews.com...
>
> VanguardLH wrote:
>>
>> Sounds like it is time to toss the flaky old USB hub and get an new
>> one for $7.
>
> $7? Where can you get it for $7?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...%2Dport&Page=1

(or short URL = http://preview.tinyurl.com/3yx48d)

However, many are bus-powered (which they misname as self-powered) or
require the addition of an "optional" power adapter (at further
expense, of course). I noticed the cheapest 4-port USB 2.0 hub in the
list that includes the power adapter is $11 (but I've never heard of
the Anywhere brand). The next one up is the Rosewill for a $1 more.
So the $5 and $7 models are those that are bus-powered or don't
include the power adapter, sorry. It's possible you could reuse the
old power adapter provided it supplied the correct voltage and also
could push out the required milliamps.

In article <Of#3qUFTIHA.4656@TK2MSFTNGP03.phx.gbl>,
comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.chips, VanguardLH@mail.invalid says...
> "krw" wrote in message
> news:MPG.21e38d03dbbc123b9897eb@news.individual.ne t...
> >
> >> Vanguard said:
> >> Sounds like it is time to toss the flaky old USB hub and get an new
> >> one for $7.
> >
> > I was thinking the same thing, but it sounded too simple. ;-) I
> > found one model I liked (seven-ports, two on top) so bought a
> > spare, just in case. I can't even buy the wall wart that came with
> > it for $7.
>
> There are usually price breaks for products after which the rise in
> price is almost logarithmic. 4-port USB hubs are most common and
> probably where you get the best price break per port. Of course,
> popular branding will cost you.

I paid $7 for the hub *AND* wall wart. That's my point. I wasn't
near it when I posted earlier, but it's a Belkin.

> A self-powered 4-port USB hub (which obviously includes the power
> adapter) starts at $5 (and Iogear is an okay brand). A 7-port USB hub
> (for a brand that I've heard of) runs about $20. It's just like CPUs:
> you'll find a sweet price break afterwhich the jumps in price far
> outstrips the meager increase in speed.

How about "Belkin"? BTW, NewEgg is Charging $30 now for the silver
version:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817394056

> Sounds like you're trying to replace both USB hubs with one.

Huh? I said nothing about replacing anything. I did mention that
I bought a spare (nice hub for what I paid, why not?).

--
Keith

"Yousuf Khan" wrote in message
news:VZGdnbESDeVeSuTaRVn_vwA@giganews.com...
>
> VanguardLH wrote:
>>
>> Sounds like it is time to toss the flaky old USB hub and get an new
>> one for $7.
>
> $7? Where can you get it for $7?


(Microsoft's NNTP is being stubborn again and accepting but not
submitting some posts, so I'll try this again.)

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...%2Dport&Page=1

(or short URL = http://preview.tinyurl.com/3yx48d)

However, many are bus-powered (which they misname as self-powered) or
require the addition of an "optional" power adapter (at further
expense, of course). I noticed the cheapest 4-port USB 2.0 hub in the
list that includes the power adapter is $11 (but I've never heard of
the Anywhere brand). The next one up is the Rosewill for a $1 more.
So the $5 and $7 models are those that are bus-powered or don't
include the power adapter, sorry. It's possible you could reuse the
old power adapter provided it supplied the correct voltage and also
could push out the required milliamps.

"VanguardLH" <VanguardLH@mail.invalid> wrote in message
news:Ob$f3XtSIHA.1184@TK2MSFTNGP04.phx.gbl...
> "Yousuf Khan" <bbbl67@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> news:ipSdnROWzJM6I-vaRVn_vwA@giganews.com...
>>I have two generic 4-port USB hubs that are supposed to be USB 2.0
>>compliant. The older one is fine, works as advertised. Meanwhile the newer
>>one sometimes shows up under the USB 2.0 root hub (i.e. "Standard Enhanced
>>PCI to USB Host Controller"), or usually it shows up under the slower
>>"Standard OpenHCD USB Host Controller" (USB 1.1).
>>
>> My motherboard (Asus M2NPV-VM) USB ports are all USB 2.0 compliant, and
>> they individually auto-detect whether they need to switch down to USB 1.1
>> speeds. I'm using a Microsoft tool called UVCView under Windows XP to
>> display the details of the USB devices, including the hubs and roothubs.
>>
>> According to UVCView, the older hub and newer hub seem to have the same
>> chipset vendor (idVendor = "Genesys Logic, Inc."), although externally
>> they look quite different and have different brand names. So I'm not sure
>> why one would be consistently USB 2.0 compliant, while the other one is
>> not.
>>
>> Now another interesting thing I noticed is that the inconsistent hub will
>> only show up as USB 2.0-compliant after I boot into Windows after having
>> previously rebooted from Ubuntu 7.10 Linux (dual-boot system). So maybe
>> Linux does something to the device that puts it right. But when I list
>> the devices while in Linux I see that it is listed under USB 1.1 just
>> like when in Windows. I have no idea why Linux leaves the hub fixed for
>> Windows, but doesn't fix it for itself?!
>>
>> Any idea what's going on with this hub?
>>
>> Yousuf Khan
>
>
> Are both of these a self-powered hub (i.e., they have a power adapter) or
> a low-power hub that relies on the current supplied from the USB
> controller at the motherboard? If they are bus-powered hubs, they CANNOT
> be on the same USB controller. Each controller provides 2 ports
> (channels) but these 2 ports still share the same controller and so both
> are limited by a total amperage that can be supplied by the same
> controller.

Sorry, but that isn't true. Bus powered hubs are deliberately limited to
100mA per port precisely so that they don't exceed the 500mA available from
the root hub port. You can connect 8 of them to the 8 ports of the USB2
enhanced root ports if you want to. The current available from any root
port is 500mA per port regardless of what is connected to the others. In
practice you can get a bit more than that before the over current protection
kicks in. Current not used on one port does not become available to the
others because the over current protection is implimented on a per port
basis.

Of course, what you can't do is to *cascade* bus powered hubs.

"Yousuf Khan" <bbbl67@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:ipSdnROWzJM6I-vaRVn_vwA@giganews.com...
>I have two generic 4-port USB hubs that are supposed to be USB 2.0
>compliant. The older one is fine, works as advertised. Meanwhile the newer
>one sometimes shows up under the USB 2.0 root hub (i.e. "Standard Enhanced
>PCI to USB Host Controller"), or usually it shows up under the slower
>"Standard OpenHCD USB Host Controller" (USB 1.1).
>
> My motherboard (Asus M2NPV-VM) USB ports are all USB 2.0 compliant, and
> they individually auto-detect whether they need to switch down to USB 1.1
> speeds. I'm using a Microsoft tool called UVCView under Windows XP to
> display the details of the USB devices, including the hubs and roothubs.
>
> According to UVCView, the older hub and newer hub seem to have the same
> chipset vendor (idVendor = "Genesys Logic, Inc."), although externally
> they look quite different and have different brand names. So I'm not sure
> why one would be consistently USB 2.0 compliant, while the other one is
> not.
>
> Now another interesting thing I noticed is that the inconsistent hub will
> only show up as USB 2.0-compliant after I boot into Windows after having
> previously rebooted from Ubuntu 7.10 Linux (dual-boot system). So maybe
> Linux does something to the device that puts it right. But when I list the
> devices while in Linux I see that it is listed under USB 1.1 just like
> when in Windows. I have no idea why Linux leaves the hub fixed for
> Windows, but doesn't fix it for itself?!
>

There are actually surprisingly few different chipsets despite the wide
variety of different looking hubs. I would suggest that you problem hub
either has a poor cable connection or that the hub chipset itself is very
close to being detected as poor USB2 operation in which case it reverts back
to USB1.

Hubs are cheap enough these days that it is simplest just to replace it.