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Multiple USB 2.0 Into 3.0 Hub

Zoravar
By Zoravar
in Peripherals
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Posted

Hi Everyone, 

 

I need to connect multiple "high" bandwidth devices to a computer for simultaneous use.  All the devices are USB 2.0 but use a lot of bandwidth (some storage devices, cameras, etc.).  Together they will probably use more than the 480mbps the USB 2.0 spec provides.  This is one of the reasons why I'm looking at getting a USB 3.0 hub to plug everything into.  But it's mainly because it's a 3.0 port they will be sharing. 

 

However, I wasn't sure if this would work in reality. Will a 3.0 hub be able to provide a 5.0gbps backbone that the USB 2.0 devices can share and tap into simultaneously (each at their max 480mbps)? Similar to how a 10gbps uplink port would function on a 1gbps network switch? Or will the whole setup be limited by the slowest member (effectively making it a 2.0 hub)?

 

Here's a (horrible) paint image to try and illustrate my question. 

 

Concept.png

 

Thanks. 

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Posted

No they will run at the 2.0 speed. Basically that's like trying to run a PCIe 3.0 x16 device at full speed in a 2.0 slot, you'll only get half the bandwith. You will see the same speeds if you used a 2.0 Hub or just directly input the devices in the computer (in a 2,3, or 3.1 A slot) It runs at what the device was designed to run at

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5 minutes ago, likwidsolutions said:

No they will run at the 2.0 speed. 

1

Darn.  But I kind of figured that would happen.  Thanks. 

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Even though the "backbone" is faster, each device will still be limited to USB2.0. You won't get any speed boost when copying to one device, but it might (can not promise) help with copying to multiple devices at the same time.

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I knew each individual device wouldn't get faster but was hoping that simultaneous access would be better. 

 

I'm thinking I'll just buy one (they're not too much money), and see if I can get better simultaneous access.  If not, oh well.  

 

Thanks. 

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  • 2 weeks later...
Posted

I know this is a bit old, but I was watching a video that I forgot about a while back, and I don't know what you were/are tryting to do, but if you had a bunch of thumbdrives in a raid format (kind weird but hey, to each their own I saw this video which was just an interesting kind of "what if" scenario):
 


Keep in mind this is on a Mac but should be able to do on Windows.

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