USB to 3.5″ hdd dock with support for USB power delivery?

[Bakgrund]

Does this product exist? I don't want to use one of these devices that require both a USB cable and an external power supply, I want one that supports USB power delivery so I can use just one cable connected to my pc with no extra power source.

[Eighjan]

5 minutes ago, Bakgrund said:

Does this product exist? I don't want to use one of these devices that require both a USB cable and an external power supply, I want one that supports USB power delivery so I can use just one cable connected to my pc with no extra power source.

I seem to remember looking for just this a while back... 3½" drives - even S-ATA ones - "need" 12v & USB can't provide that much.

Edited December 6, 2021 by Eighjan

[BondiBlue]

No, they don't. 3.5" drives need 12V power, which is why they need an external power supply. 

[Bakgrund]

1 minute ago, BondiBlue said:

No, they don't. 3.5" drives need 12V power, which is why they need an external power supply. 

Should be possible with a step up module.

[BondiBlue]

Just now, Bakgrund said:

Should be possible with a step up module.

Good luck getting the kind of current needed from a 5V source, especially if you wanted to use an older drive. Some older SATA drives need quite a bit of current at startup, and that's a 12V. 

[Eighjan]

3 minutes ago, Bakgrund said:

Should be possible with a step up module.

... and that may cost you the difference - or more than - between an active & a passive powered USB adapter.

 

Don't you think if 12v over USB was possible, it would have been done by now?

Edited December 6, 2021 by Eighjan

[Bakgrund]

Just now, BondiBlue said:

Good luck getting the kind of current needed from a 5V source, especially if you wanted to use an older drive. Some older SATA drives need quite a bit of current at startup, and that's a 12V. 

 

It just sounds unreasonable that you can power a  monitor by USB PD but not a 3.5 inch hard drive.

[Eighjan]

4 minutes ago, Bakgrund said:

 

It just sounds unreasonable that you can power a  monitor by USB PD but not a 3.5 inch hard drive.

A monitor is a lot bigger than a 3½ HDD to be able to house a 5v to 12v transformer...

Besides, I doubt a monitor WOULD be powered by 5v over USB; if one can, please link it...

[BondiBlue]

4 minutes ago, Bakgrund said:

It just sounds unreasonable that you can power a  monitor by USB PD but not a 3.5 inch hard drive.

Those portable monitors don't draw much power at all, and they run from 5V. That's not unreasonable at all. 

[Eighjan]

3 minutes ago, BondiBlue said:

Those portable monitors don't draw much power at all, and they run from 5V. That's not unreasonable at all. 

Sounds reasonable... more reasonable than a 24" desktop unit over 5V, any way.

 

Besides, @Bakgrund - 3½" HDD technology pre-dates USB by a good decade or more.

Edited December 6, 2021 by Eighjan

[BondiBlue]

2 minutes ago, Eighjan said:

Sounds reasonable... more reasonable than a 24" desktop unit over 5V, any way

There are many USB-C based portable displays. I have this one, and it can be powered through USB-C or Micro-USB (both at 5V), and can handle input through USB-C or HDMI. I've powered it from the front panel USB-A ports on a couple Dell OptiPlex machines in the past without issue, so it doesn't need much current either. 

[AbydosOne]

23 minutes ago, Bakgrund said:

I want one that supports USB power delivery so I can use just one cable connected to my pc with no extra power source.

I've not encountered a PC that can source USB-PD, only sink it. While there's not really a technical limitation for that (actually, it would be pretty simple), there just isn't a need for computers to be able to source that much power into an external device.

[Eigenvektor]

19 minutes ago, Eighjan said:

A monitor is a lot bigger than a 3½ HDD to be able to house a 5v to 12v transformer...

Besides, I doubt a monitor WOULD be powered by 5v over USB; if one can, please link it...

Typically it's the monitor that provides USB-PD, which is then used to power a laptop. USB-PD doesn't just use 5V though. It has multiple possible voltages:

 

USB-PD specifies 5V, 9V, 12V and 20V @ 5A for a maximum of 100W

USB-PD revision 3.1 extends this up to 48V @ 5A for a maximum of 240W

 

So it should certainly be possible to power a HDD with it, provided the HDD supports the USB-PD standard.

[Bakgrund]

 

23 minutes ago, Eighjan said:

Sounds reasonable... more reasonable than a 24" desktop unit over 5V, any way.

 

Besides, @Bakgrund - 3½" HDD technology pre-dates USB by a good decade or more.

 

Electricity was discovered many centuries ago but that doesn't mean it's changed at all. 5w is 5w, stepping up 5v to 12v is not difficult, space-consuming or expensive. It's really simple. It should not be a problem, and anyone claiming so with the argument that 3.5 inch hard drives are older than monitors just proves that they don't know jack sh*t of what they are talking about.

 

25 minutes ago, BondiBlue said:

Those portable monitors don't draw much power at all, and they run from 5V. That's not unreasonable at all. 

They consume way more than a 3.5 inch hard drive, that's for a fact. A 3.5 inch hard drive uses no more than 10 watts in use, even if it's double that during startup or whatever it's way less than USB PD can handle.

[Bakgrund]

3 minutes ago, Eigenvektor said:

Typically it's the monitor that provides USB-PD, which is then used to power a laptop. USB-PD doesn't just use 5V though. It has multiple possible voltages:

 

USB-PD specifies 5V, 9V, 12V and 20V @ 5A for a maximum of 100W

USB-PD revision 3.1 extends this up to 48V @ 5A for a maximum of 240W

 

So it should certainly be possible to power a HDD with it, provided the HDD supports the USB-PD standard.

Yeah it should really not be difficult from a technical standpoint, but the Einsteins that replied to me earlier seem to think so.

[BondiBlue]

13 minutes ago, Bakgrund said:

They consume way more than a 3.5 inch hard drive, that's for a fact. LG 32UN880 for example specifies 60 W. A 3.5 inch hard drive uses no more than 10 watts in use, even if it's double that during startup or whatever it's way less than USB PD can handle.

Where on earth did you get the idea that you can power that monitor through USB? You seem really confused on what monitors can and cannot be powered through USB. You cannot power that LG monitor through USB-C. It's designed to output power through USB-C to charge a connected device, such as a phone, laptop, or tablet. The types of monitors you can power through USB don't need much current at all. See the one I linked in another comment. I've run it from a 5V/1A source without issue. 

 

11 minutes ago, Bakgrund said:

Yeah it should really not be difficult from a technical standpoint, but the Einsteins that replied to me earlier seem to think so.

The problem isn't that it would be difficult. The problem is that USB PD devices aren't usually designed to output that much power. A laptop might be able to charge from USB-C, but that doesn't mean it can output those voltages itself. 

[Eigenvektor]

1 minute ago, Bakgrund said:

Yeah it should really not be difficult from a technical standpoint, but the Einsteins that replied to me earlier seem to think so.

Keep in mind though that USB-PD is more than just a plug. It's a protocol. So unless your device(s) speak the protocol the supplier isn't going to step up the voltage. Normal USB ports may be limited anywhere between 2.5W up to 15W depending on the type.

 

That being said, I was able to find a 3.5" drive that is powered through USB-C, however it seems to be a complete drive, rather than just an enclosure: https://www.pcmag.com/reviews/seagate-innov8 – As the article notes, it's not compatible with all devices, since most computers and especially laptops aren't designed to power devices through USB.

[AbydosOne]

1 minute ago, Eigenvektor said:

USB-PD specifies 5V, 9V, 12V and 20V @ 5A for a maximum of 100W

For the sake of completeness, there's a 15V level as well, and IIRC the 12V level isn't universal in the PD 2.0 standard (I have a PD dummy plug, and I can't always get 12V (I think) out of some devices).

 

3 minutes ago, Bakgrund said:

Electricity was discovered many centuries ago but that doesn't mean it's changed at all. 5w is 5w, stepping up 5v to 12v is not difficult, space-consuming or expensive. It's really simple. It should not be a problem, and anyone claiming so with the argument that 3.5 inch hard drives are older than monitors just proves that they don't know jack sh*t of what they are talking about.

Chill, sir/madam. They're not entirely wrong either. 3.5" HDDs can draw quite a bit of 12V power at spinup: ~1A @ 12V -> ~2.4A @ 5V (not counting the fairly significant power losses from boost converting), which is more than most whole motherboard USB power planes can supply.

 

7 minutes ago, Bakgrund said:

They consume way more than a 3.5 inch hard drive, that's for a fact.

Nah, they're basically an overgrown phone screen with some LEDs behind it. There's no moving parts, and demand for hyper-efficient screen tech has gotten to the point that 5V is probably high (likely all 3.3V or lower internally). I'd wager than even at idle, those screen pull less power than an HDD.

 

11 minutes ago, Bakgrund said:

LG 32UN880 for example specifies 60 W

You could power it using USB-PD, but not sourced from a computer.

[Kilrah]

26 minutes ago, AbydosOne said:

I've not encountered a PC that can source USB-PD, only sink it.

My desktop PC can source 12V from its USB-C port. Laptops typically can't though, and that'll be the whole problem for that kind of device - average people would buy one and complain it didn't work where they wanted it to 

[Eigenvektor]

5 minutes ago, AbydosOne said:

You could power it using USB-PD, but not sourced from a computer.

Actually I think the monitor is designed to provide up to 60W, that's not the monitor's maximum power draw. It's a PD source, not a sink.

 

The specs on LG's website say it uses up to 160W.

[AbydosOne]

1 minute ago, Kilrah said:

My desktop PC can source 12V from its USB-C port

What's your motherboard model? Have you actually measured it at 12V? I'm curious what charging protocol it supports (I'm assuming QC2/3, not PD).

[Bakgrund]

3 minutes ago, BondiBlue said:

Where on earth did you get the idea that you can power that monitor through USB? You seem really confused on what monitors can and cannot be powered through USB. 

 

The problem isn't that it would be difficult. The problem is that USB PD devices aren't usually designed to output that much power. A laptop might be able to charge from USB-C, but that doesn't mean it can output those voltages itself. 

 

No I misunderstood the spec of the monitor i referred to, but there are actually some monitors that can receive both power and signal from one usb c connector. for example Lenovo m14 and Asus MB169C.

[BondiBlue]

Just now, Bakgrund said:

No I misunderstood the spec of the monitor i referred to, but there are actually some monitors that can receive both power and signal from one usb c connector. for example Lenovo m14 and Asus MB169C.

Those are just simple portable monitors. They don't need much current at all for their LED backlighting. They're basically laptop displays put into an external housing.

[Eighjan]

USB wasn't originally designed to POWER devices, just replace Serial & Parallel for data transmission for printers.

3½" drives have always needed a decent amount of power to work (originally Molex), so expecting USB to power them is a long shot.

 

Even 40-pin P-ATA docks for 3½" drives needed external power, so something about 3½" or even 5¼" (optical) drives meant that some of the power requirement was outside USB capability from even that far back.

 

TL; DR is that USB was probably never (initially) designed to work with 12v... miniaturisation & better efficiency may have helped, but I don't see that it has to be possible because of such advances...

Anyway, do you intend to use the dock more than once/after the drives' data has been migrated...?  If not, migrate the data to a USB stick - probably cheaper & more cost effective, in the long run.

[Kilrah]

18 minutes ago, AbydosOne said:

What's your motherboard model? Have you actually measured it at 12V? I'm curious what charging protocol it supports (I'm assuming QC2/3, not PD).

Asrock Z270 and Z390 ITX. Nope only supports PD, at 5 and 12V/3A.

Portable 15" monitor runs at 12V from it (needed to get full brightness too)