Too many USB inputs - How many peripherals / hardware is too much?

[Blair McConachie]

I am getting strange behavior where sometimes USB inputs just stop responding and windows cant see them. If I unplug them and re-insert its usually fine. Its always the same items I have issues with, started with a keyboard which I thought was faulty but now its happening to new peripherals I have added.

I'm not sure if you can overload a USB connection with too many devices? My PC is setup like this

• Motherboard USB port #1 - DD Wheel base in direct
• Motherboard USB port #2- pedals in direct
• Motherboard USB port #3- Anker 7 way powered hub

The powered 7 way hub has:

• G213 logitech keyboard
• fanatec hand brake
• fanatec h-shifter
• vbox USB (usually off)
• wireless mouse dongle
• USB headphones
• USB 4-way Extension (Not powered)
  • stream deck
  • Apex p1-X pods
  • Apex Race deck button box
  • Aiologs seq shifter

The items that randomly dont show up when the PC is started are both APEX items + the keyboard. Is there a way I can trouble shoot this. Maybe the stream deck draws to much power for the non-powered 4-way and the apex units dont show up (until un-plugged and plugged back in and then they show up and work).

The only thing I think I could do to improve / trouble shoot is to get the stream deck direct into a powered usb port not off the extension. Only keep low data connectoins on the non powered 4 way (i.e. swap stream deck with the h-pattern).

 

[Emery]

Most monitors have USB ports, so you can try using that as an extra USB powered hub.

 

[EsxPaul]

I'm not sure if you can overload a USB connection with too many devices?

You definitely can. I've had these issues in the past and had to do lots of investigating to get to the bottom of it. There's no single answer as it's dependent on which motherboard you have and how it's usb ports are split between the various USB controllers. Which motherboard are you using?

 

[Blair McConachie]

It’s an older corsair one compact pc. A quick search says it’s a Z270 motherboard. Is there maybe diagnostics software that would help working out if one USB port is getting too much data?

 

[EsxPaul]

It’s an older corsair one compact pc. A quick search says it’s a Z270 motherboard. Is there maybe diagnostics software that would help working out if one USB port is getting too much data?

Yes, you can download and use this USB Device Tree Viewer which should enable you to see which devices are allocated to each controller. You can then start to move devices around to possibly spread the workload.

One thing I would suggest is that you pick up another powered hub and you that if possible. Joining one hub to another as you are doing now doesn't seem very optimal.

 

[Blair McConachie]

Thanks I will try that software. That’s exactly the sort of thing I was after. I will try that first and move the stream deck to direct into the powered usb. If that doesn’t work I’ll get another powered usb connection and start splitting again.

 

[CorvusCoraxUK]

What's the PSU rated to on the 7-port USB hub? If it is less than 3.5A (max 0.5A per port, per USB 2.0 specs - max 0.9A per port for 3.0 I think) then you might run into issues, especially chaining to a bus powered hub. There are cheap 7-port powered USB 2.0 hubs on the market where the PSU only supplies 1A (I have a couple and have to take that into account).

In theory your motherboard ports should supply 0.5A/09.A each depending on USB version, but I have found that hit and miss in practice.

For example on one of my computers (Intel Z87 chipset, so rather long in the tooth) the backlight in the keyboard draws more current than it will supply at higher brightness settings. Oddly it's fine on another computer with the same model of motherboard, the only difference being Windows version.