USB 3.0 - PCIe card vs ext. hub

[Daemonius]

My new build is in planning stage and currently I have so many USB peripherals that I need more ports.

 

My to be motherboard (link) will have 7 A-ports and one C-port. My monitor has 4 x 3.0 hub. All this will not be enough.

 

So my question is, should I get Winstar USB 3.0 -hub that has 4 x 3.0 ports with C-type connection or DeLock PCI-Express x1 card that has 4 x 3.0 ports.

 

If you must know why I need so many, here's the list:

 

-Keyboard (2 ports, mouse is on the KB hub)

-Webcam

-Focusrite Scarlett

-Steinberg USB-eLicenser

-Steinberg CC121 controller

-Printer

-Monitor hub (on which there are the following)

--External 2 TB HD

--External 4 TB HD

--Scanner

--LG G Watch R chargerpad

 

In addition to this there will be a 2 port requirement for an external BR drive.

[Tiwaz]

6 minutes ago, Daemonius said:

 

I'd get the PCIe card because it would also work on PCs that dont have usb type c

[glitchmaster0001]

I'd get the front panel one because I hate going over to the back of my computer and reaching for those ports. Having ports in the front makes it a lot easier and more convenient. Though the PCI Express card would work on a lot more PCs so there's that to consider.  

[mariushm]

Your motherboard looks like this:

 

 

That motherboard has :

 

1. 1 x USB Type-C™ port on the back panel, with USB 3.1 Gen 2 support
2. 1 x USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type-A port (red) on the back panel

^^ These two are capable of 10gbps and come from AsMedia2142 which is connected directly to the CPU or to the chipset through a PCI-E 3.0 x1 link ( 980MB/s in both directions). So you have 2 x 10 gbps ports that are squeezed in about  8 gbps  of bandwidth. 

 

If you plug usb 3.0 (5gbps) devices like external hard drives it should be fine. I wouldn't recommend plugging low latency stuff to these ports (like sound recorders or stuff like that)

 

Chipset:

1. 8 x USB 3.1 Gen 1 ports (4 ports on the back panel, 4 ports available through the internal USB headers)
2. 6 x USB 2.0/1.1 ports (2 ports on the back panel, 4 ports available through the internal USB headers)

^^ the yellow and blue usb ports are usb 3.0 5 gbps , plain usb 3.0

 

Like the text says you have 4 ports on the back and also 2 headers, each with 2 ports (the ones to the left of the big 24 pin connector) ... so your front case panel should have at least 2 usb 3.0 ports that you plug in at least one of those headers.

It kinda sucks that they're placed in the ideal position to connect usb 3.0 connectors from the case because not all cases have FOUR usb 3.0 in front. If you have a case with just 2 front usb 3.0 connectors, one header will be there unused. 

You can buy brackets that have 2 or 4 usb 3.0 ports on the bracket and the connectors that go in those headers but I'm not sure the cable is long enough to reach that far to the other side of the board. It could also be ugly.

Usually they're designed for headers which are at the bottom of the motherboard.

Here's an example of such bracket : https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16812186177 and here's one with a longer black cable and cheaper : http://amzn.to/2t73tU2

 

You can find them cheaper on Amazon or other sites and you may even find brackets with 4 usb 3.0 headers.

 

Alternatively, you can get front panel things with multiple usb 3.0 ports like this one: https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817182338

 

So basicall, you will have  10 usb 3.0 connectors, of which 6 will be in the back of the motherboard

 

Like the text says, you also have 6 USB 2.0 connectors, two of which are on the back of the motherboard. Those are good enough for keyboard, mouse, maybe security dongles, nothing that needs super fast speeds. 

 

4 of those ports are only as headers on the motherboard... again, you can buy brackets and can just plug the connectors in the headers ... here's an example with 4 ports : https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA76H2GT5661 or this one on Amazon cheap and good : http://amzn.to/2s8dziS and here's an example with 2 ports : https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA6RP3942704

 

This way you'd have 10 usb 3.0 ports and 6 usb 2.0 ports , for a total of 16 ports and no need for extra pci-e cards or tricks.

 

But if you do decide to buy something, probably pci-e cards would be better for you.

 

 

 

 

 

[Daemonius]

21 minutes ago, Tiwaz said:

I'd get the PCIe card because it would also work on PCs that dont have usb type c

The MB will have one C-port, and I currently don't have any other use for that...

 

12 minutes ago, glitchmaster0001 said:

I'd get the front panel one because I hate going over to the back of my computer and reaching for those ports. Having ports in the front makes it a lot easier and more convenient. Though the PCI Express card would work on a lot more PCs so there's that to consider.  

All of the use for those ports are the kind of that doesn't need for replugging, once it is plugged, it stays plugged. The case has two front ports.

[glitchmaster0001]

2 minutes ago, Daemonius said:

The MB will have one C-port, and I currently don't have any other use for that...

 

All of the use for those ports are the kind of that doesn't need for replugging, once it is plugged, it stays plugged. The case has two front ports.

oh if they dont need to be replugged, then i would go for the rear port solution as you potentially have more bandwidth via the PCI Express interface. 

[Daemonius]

6 minutes ago, mariushm said:

Spoiler

 

Your motherboard looks like this:

 

 

That motherboard has :

 

1. 1 x USB Type-C™ port on the back panel, with USB 3.1 Gen 2 support
2. 1 x USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type-A port (red) on the back panel

^^ These two are capable of 10gbps and come from AsMedia2142 which is connected directly to the CPU or to the chipset through a PCI-E 3.0 x1 link ( 980MB/s in both directions). So you have 2 x 10 gbps ports that are squeezed in about  8 gbps  of bandwidth. 

 

If you plug usb 3.0 (5gbps) devices like external hard drives it should be fine. I wouldn't recommend plugging low latency stuff to these ports (like sound recorders or stuff like that)

 

Chipset:

1. 8 x USB 3.1 Gen 1 ports (4 ports on the back panel, 4 ports available through the internal USB headers)
2. 6 x USB 2.0/1.1 ports (2 ports on the back panel, 4 ports available through the internal USB headers)

^^ the yellow and blue usb ports are usb 3.0 5 gbps , plain usb 3.0

 

Like the text says you have 4 ports on the back and also 2 headers, each with 2 ports (the ones to the left of the big 24 pin connector) ... so your front case panel should have at least 2 usb 3.0 ports that you plug in at least one of those headers.

The motherboard has 2 headers each for 2 usb 3.0 ports ... kina sucks that they're placed in the ideal position to connect usb 3.0 connectors from the case. If you have a case with just 2 front usb 3.0 connectors, one header will be there unused. 

You can buy brackets that have 2 or 4 usb 3.0 ports and just the connector that plugs in those headers but I'm not sure the cable is long enough to reach that far to the other side of the board. Usually they're designed for headers which are at the bottom of the motherboard

Here's an example of such bracket : https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16812186177

You can find them cheaper on Amazon or other sites and you may even find brackets with 4 usb 3.0 headers.

Alternatively, you can get front panel things with multiple usb 3.0 ports like this one: https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817182338

 

So basicall, you will have  10 usb 3.0 connectors, of which 6 will be in the back of the motherboard

 

Like the text says, you also have 6 USB 2.0 connectors, two of which are on the back of the motherboard. Those are good enough for keyboard, mouse, maybe security dongles, nothing that needs super fast speeds. 

 

4 of those ports are only as headers on the motherboard... again, you can buy brackets and can just plug the connectors in the headers ... here's an example with 4 ports : https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA76H2GT5661

 and here's an example with 2 ports : https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA6RP3942704

 

This way you'd have 10 usb 3.0 ports and 6 usb 2.0 ports , for a total of 16 ports.

 

 

1st, thanks for your post. I put the quote in spoilers because of the length.

 

I haven't yet planned on what to plug where, maybe I'll plug the keyboard (Corsair K70 RGB) in to those yellow ports. Focusrite Scarlett doesn't like the USB 3.0 port so that needs to be on the 2.0 port, and to be on the safe side so will the Steinberg CC121 controller.

 

I'm not sure but I might have one or two of those brackets lying around somewhere. I'll need to check on that.

 

Here's a list of my future build. https://pcpartpicker.com/user/Daemonius/saved/sqbbvK

[Daemonius]

9 minutes ago, glitchmaster0001 said:

oh if they dont need to be replugged, then i would go for the rear port solution as you potentially have more bandwidth via the PCI Express interface. 

If I don't have any brackets with internal connectors lying around, I might. Although, doesn't the USB-C have enough bandwidth already?

[glitchmaster0001]

Just now, Daemonius said:

If I don't have any brackets with internal connectors lying around, I might. Although, doesn't the USB-C have enough bandwidth already?

depends, if you motherboard has the connector for USB C or not. 

[Daemonius]

Just now, glitchmaster0001 said:

depends, if you motherboard has the connector for USB C or not. 

It does.

[glitchmaster0001]

1 minute ago, Daemonius said:

It does.

in that case, i would get the front port solution since it has the USB C connector, which is highly versatile 

[Daemonius]

Just now, glitchmaster0001 said:

in that case, i would get the front port solution since it has the USB C connector, which is highly versatile 

The case doesn't have any place to mount the front port version. (Corsair 400C). I was thinking of a basic USB hub. I'll add a picture of it.

[glitchmaster0001]

Just now, Daemonius said:

The case doesn't have any place to mount the front port version. (Corsair 400C). I was thinking of a basic USB hub. I'll add a picture of it.

that could work. in the case where you plug it into the back ports of the motherboard, then let it sit on the top of the chassis

[Daemonius]

Just now, glitchmaster0001 said:

that could work. in the case where you plug it into the back ports of the motherboard, then let it sit on the top of the chassis

That was the plan, or maybe stick it on the rear of the case somehow.

[mariushm]

A hub will split the bandwidth to all the ports. You have 5 gbps coming into the hub, and you have 5 gbps to all connectors.

However, if you have two devices plugged into the hub and you're using both at the same time, they'll each have about half of the maximum throughput.

 

For example, the maximum number of bits that can be transferred in a second is 5 gbps for plain usb 3.0.. but when data is transferred, 2 bits out of every 10 bits are error correction data, not actual data... so in reality you have only 4 gbps of actual data transffered in a second... that's 500.000.000 bytes or about 477 MB/s.

But the data is also formatted in data packets when it goes through the cable, it's not a raw flow of bits, so the actual maximum throughput when transferring files is pretty much below 450 MB/s... let's say 450 MB/s to keep things simple. 

 

Now, let's say you have two external hard drives plugged in that usb 3.0 hub and you start copying files from both to your computer. The controller chip inside the hub may read from each hard drive with 450 MB/s but when it comes into your computer, you're only getting around 220 MB/s from each hard drive, because the hub gives each device half the maximum bandwidth.

 

Your 2 USB 3.1 gen 2 ports are 10 gbps, meaning you could in theory get up to around 1.1 GB/s from a device plugged in a single port, but the controller that creates those 2 ports talks to the computer through a single pci-e x1 link, which is limited to around 980 MB/s .. due to various inefficiencies, don't expect more than around 900 MB/s from the chip.

So basically look at that controller like a hub with two 10gbps ports - yeah, you can plug two devices and each will think they work at 10 gbps, but if you have for example two SSDs in those ports and you start copying data from both at the same time, you'll copy with around 450-500 MB/s from each SSD

If you copy from just one SSD, you may get up to around 900 MB/s from that SSD.

 

If you have devices that you only use periodically like scanner and printer that do usb 3.0, then those could go in a usb 3.0  HUB because those don't do long term transfers at high speed, and don't use the full bandwidth.

 

But something like a webcam could use 2-3 gbps of bandwidth for as long as it runs, if it sends the captured image uncompressed to the PC.  Same for high quality capture cards, which don't have internal hardware encoders (cheap capture cards have a chip which encodes to mp4 h264 10-30 mbps and sends this data through usb, instead of 3-4 gbps  raw stream from the camera sensor).

 

For such devices, you want to use pci-e x1 or x4 cards with a controller that creates those ports, or one of those brackets for existing headers

 

Another important thing that is skipped over here ... these hubs usually don't come with external power adapters, or the power adapters suck.

A usb 3.0 port can give a device up to 5v at 0.9A or about 4.5 watts - that's why your bluray thing needs two usb 3.0 ports, because it may use more than 4.5w during operation.

 

Unless you use some external power adapter with a usb 3.0 hub, the power that comes in the hub from the computer (those 4.5w ) is split between all the connectors of the hub, after around 0.2-0.3 watts are used by the chip inside to create the connectors.  So without additional power, a usb 3.0 hub is only good for things that don't suck a lot of power from it, like mice or maybe scanners (as those usually have separate power) or printers.

You wouldn't put a webcam powered only from the usb hub AND something else into a single hub, the devices could behave erratically as they don't have a lot of power.

Cheap hubs usually come with very cheap power adapters, better stay away from such devices.

 

For these reasons, it's better to just go with internal pci-e cards as those will give enough power usually to each port.

 

We could go in other discussions like for example chipset only having a 4 GB/s link to the processor and all the sata ports and usb ports and pci-e slots created by the chipset and other crap is squeezed through 4 GB/s to the cpu so that's another bottleneck... 

 

Anyway, my advice for now would be to find some brackets to make those usb 2.0 ports functional and plug things like printer and dongles and devices with low speed there. You won't care that a print job is sent to the printer in 10 seconds instead of 4 seconds, as the print job will take minutes anyway.

 

maybe usb 2 -Keyboard (2 ports, mouse is on the KB hub)    some keyboards with lots of leds require usb 3.0 for the additional current to light the frickin' leds.

usb 3 - Webcam

usb 2 -Focusrite Scarlett

usb 2 -Steinberg USB-eLicenser

maybe 3 (no clue what this is) -Steinberg CC121 controller

usb 2 -Printer

usb 3 -Monitor hub (on which there are the following)

usb 3 --External 2 TB HD

usb 3 --External 4 TB HD

usb 2/3 --Scanner (maybe 3 if you scan often and high dpi images and scanner is aware of usb 3.0)

usb 2 --LG G Watch R chargerpad ( usb 3.0 if it actually takes more than 0.5A the usb 2 has, and more current makes a difference in charge time)

 

 

 

[jspxs]

go for a PCI e card if the peripherals u intend to use will remain connected for extended periods of time.

Reason: hubs don't last long when u use them for long hours continuously.