Powered USB hub or not?

[Gasman]

Hi

Well the law of sod kicked in last night with the only great clear night for ages and me USB hub kicked the bucket!. I managed to concoct a couple of leads and an old unpowered hub and all seemed OK which made me wonder if I really need a powered one? The only things connected to the hub are my Atik314 CCD and Lodestar both with their own power supplies and a game handset for the mount, the lead is about 1.5m long,any thoughts please?

Cheers

Steve

[red dwalf]

i prefer using a powered hub, but i have a few more things plugged into it, although my zwo 120mm camera dosen`t like it at all, you could use active usb cables instead, thnese boost the signal as over a longish length the usb signal weakens, two of those should do the job ok, only about £5 off flea bay

[Merlin66]

I use a 6 port power hub under the scope with all the cameras plugged in ( ATik16, ATik 16icS, ATik314L and the Lodestar).

Never let me down. I use a Maplin 12v to 6v convertor to power it.

[ChrisLX200]

Frankly, it isn't worth NOT using a powered hub given the modest price to buy one. An unpowered hub can supply a maximum of 500ma split between all ports, and that might be enough depending whether the attached devices are bus powered and thus draw their power from the USB link. If the device has its own power supply then it likely won't need to draw any power at all. A powered hub can supply 500ma to each and every port in the hub. A powered USB3 hub can supply double that - but only via the extra pins on USB 3 cables (so plugging USB2 cables into a USB3 hub won't get you the extra power delivery). My Lodestar is bus powered - no PSU required, so plugging that into an unpowered hub may mean there isn't enough for other devices (only if the Lodestar needs the full 500ma)

ChrisH

[HumptyMoo]

Hi

Well the law of sod kicked in last night with the only great clear night for ages and me USB hub kicked the bucket!. I managed to concoct a couple of leads and an old unpowered hub and all seemed OK which made me wonder if I really need a powered one? The only things connected to the hub are my Atik314 CCD and Lodestar both with their own power supplies and a game handset for the mount, the lead is about 1.5m long,any thoughts please?

Cheers

Steve

You have answered your own question, if all you want is to run what is already running via unpowered hub then an unpowered hub is all you need. If like the above state, you need to run more than that, get a powered hub.