What kind of difference using Power Hub will make?

[Ari94]

Hi,

Today I bought USB Power Hub run by Electric but I am thinking what difference will it make?
Actually I got Four external drives, the latest one is 2TB and I thought I must connect them via Power USB Hub.
Can anyone tell me what is the advantage of using USB Power Hub?

Thank you.

 

[Allan D]

Hello Ari94,

When using non-powered USB hubs, the power is drawn from the USB controller (either the mainboard or the addon card). The amount of power that can be drawn from the controller is rather limited. This is enough to feed small devices like cardreaders, mouse, cooling pad, etc. But not for the devices that need more power (like USB powered scanners).

Non powered USB hubs are nice for mobile use (less cables) or when you just need a few small devices on the USB bus, but they have a downside. Although modern software detects when you are "overloading" your USB bus, some hardware can't take it and becomes unstable. Although this isn't common, it's wise to use powered USB hubs whenever you can.

For more details, see Advantages of Using a Powered USB Hub.

 

[Ari94]

Hello Ari94,

When using non-powered USB hubs, the power is drawn from the USB controller (either the mainboard or the addon card). The amount of power that can be drawn from the controller is rather limited. This is enough to feed small devices like cardreaders, mouse, cooling pad, etc. But not for the devices that need more power (like USB powered scanners).

Non powered USB hubs are nice for mobile use (less cables) or when you just need a few small devices on the USB bus, but they have a downside. Although modern software detects when you are "overloading" your USB bus, some hardware can't take it and becomes unstable. Although this isn't common, it's wise to use powered USB hubs whenever you can.

For more details, see Advantages of Using a Powered USB Hub.

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Hi Allan,

Thank you very much for the reply and details. It is very informative and helpful.
The link you provided was also very helpful.

 

[townsbg]

Basically with the power your system will be able to treat it as a USB 2.0 device which is significantly faster than USB 1.1. This is because USB 2.0 devices take more power.

 

[Ari94]

Basically with the power your system will be able to treat it as a USB 2.0 device which is significantly faster than USB 1.1. This is because USB 2.0 devices take more power.

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Hi, thank you for reply and the information you have provided.
As I got external drives USB 1 and USB 2, if I will use Power Hub the system will treat it as USB 2?
Here in Japan now a days USB 3 is popular.

 

[Allan D]

Hello Ari94,

If the external device is an USB 1 device and you connect to a USB 2 port, the data transfer rate would be as per the USB 1 that is, 1.5 Mb/s (Low-Bandwidth) and 12 Mb/s (Full-Bandwidth)[FONT=Verdana, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif]. [/FONT]

[FONT=Verdana, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif]USB 3.0 is popular because of it's data transfer rate (speed). That is 5GB/s. Recently USB 3.1 was also introduced and has the data transfer rate of 10GB/s. [/FONT]

 

[townsbg]

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Hi, thank you for reply and the information you have provided.
As I got external drives USB 1 and USB 2, if I will use Power Hub the system will treat it as USB 2?
Here in Japan now a days USB 3 is popular.

If you power the hub and the device (provided that the device has a power supply) and you plug the hub into into a USB 2.0 port then you'll get USB 2.0 speeds. As for USB 3.0 you have to have a 3.0 port on your system and a 3.0 device to take advantage of it. I'm not sure if a hub has to be 3.0 but I bet that it does. As for the speeds quoted by Allan that is the max speed which more than likely won't be obtained.

 

[Ari94]

Hello Ari94,

If the external device is an USB 1 device and you connect to a USB 2 port, the data transfer rate would be as per the USB 1 that is, 1.5 Mb/s (Low-Bandwidth) and 12 Mb/s (Full-Bandwidth).

USB 3.0 is popular because of it's data transfer rate (speed). That is 5GB/s. Recently USB 3.1 was also introduced and has the data transfer rate of 10GB/s.

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Hi Allan,

Thank you for the details you have provided.
It helped me a lot to know the difference.

 

[Ari94]

If you power the hub and the device (provided that the device has a power supply) and you plug the hub into into a USB 2.0 port then you'll get USB 2.0 speeds. As for USB 3.0 you have to have a 3.0 port on your system and a 3.0 device to take advantage of it. I'm not sure if a hub has to be 3.0 but I bet that it does. As for the speeds quoted by Allan that is the max speed which more than likely won't be obtained.

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Hi,

Thank you for the details you have provided it was very helpful informative and I learned somethings.

 

[Allan D]

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Hi Allan,

Thank you for the details you have provided.
It helped me a lot to know the difference.

Hello Ari94,

Glad to be of help!