USB Hub recommendations

[fsaviator]

Looking for personal experience recommendations for a rock-solid 7 to 10 port USB Hub, preferably with individual port switches that is powered by 12V Power adapter (5.5mm x 2.1 tip).

I am planning on replacing my hubs with three of these:

1 x in CDU bay for the MIP and CDU bays that will also feed two USB-VGA adapters for my CDUs and an OC Servo card.

1 x in the Pedestal for my ACARS printer and two DC motor cards and joystick cards on my TQ.

1 x in my overhead for an OC USB expansion card and two servo cards.


Currently I don't have an issue with dropping usb hubs (using a couple of 10-port cheap hubs) but that is probably because I have one connected to each of three computers. I am trying to eliminate one computer from the mix, hence the USB to VGA adapters, but I am always worried about it.

Thanks

[iwik]

Warren
Here is what Rays uses and recommends.
http://www.cockpitbuilders.com/community/index.php?topic=4680.msg34793;topicseen#new

Les

[Sam Llorca]

Hi Warren,

This are the ones I'm using...

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B009NESU4M/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o01_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

http://www.usbfirewire.com/parts/rr-usb2-hub7.html

I removed all the USB Hubs supplied with my cockpit because they were  blamed for my disconnects and replaced them with those, to my surprise I was still getting disconnected every flight or so, after I switched to Prosim737 with native driver support all the disconnects issues magically disappeared. (Not blaming anybody)

Is always good to have commercial grade stuff is possible.

Cheers!

[fsaviator]

Sam, you are the second to recommend these hubs.
I'm also eyeing the Industrial Startech Hubs.  Those have 350W surge protection built in to each port also and they are 2.0  Apparently OC recommends not using USB 3.0 hubs and I'll have some OC stuff plugged in.

My power in this house is a mess and the electrician tells me I'm crazy when I complain (I go through light bulbs faster than toilet paper).  I get crazy surges so all my expensive stuff runs on regulated UPS so maybe the surge protection may be good. 

[Sam Llorca]

Agree with you,  definitely need a surge protector, hope to see pictures soon, take care.

[Flying_Fox]

From my experience USB problems in many cases come from USB power supply.

I also had a sudden problem related to USB power with my TQ after I moved it to the sim from the workshop. The hub was the same  and in workshop tests all was fine.
After moving to sim, I started to have strange intermittent disconnects of my Phidgets Servo card.

They looked funny.   

I start the takeoff, increase throttle power and press the brake pedal. My parking brake disconnects as required, the brake lever drops down with a loud bang and suddenly the sim pauses for 2-5 seconds (sometimes more) and then resumes. It was not happening always. First I thought that the loud and powerful thud from parking brake lever shakes the card USB connector. Bu then I could try to release parking brake this way several times in a row when the plane was parked, and nothing was happening. Just when I was taking off, the issue showed up.

Then I found from Phidgets Panel that my Servo card disconnects and reconnects. Finally it turned out that same USB hub in sim had less powerful power supply unit - probably 500 mA (not marked) vs. 1000 mA unit that I used in workshop.

After I replaced that unit the problem stopped.
I have same kind of USB hubs as these: http://abra-electronics.com/robotics-embedded-electronics/beagle-bone/pi-hub-7-port-usb-20-powered-hub-pi-hub.html

Nick

[blueskydriver]

One of the problems I had in the past was my throttle assembly, radios and etc would disconnect from static discharge if I touched the pedestal when getting into the cockpit. Also, if I would move around sometimes and touch it, the same thing would happen.

It was suggested by Rob to ground everything with a grounding wire, by attaching the wire to the USB cable that went into the hub, as well as attaching the grounding wire to the throttle assembly. I did that and attached the other end of the ground wire to a three prong ground plug, that I plugged into an outlet; thereby, using the ground (earth grounding) of the outlet. After doing all of that, no more disconnects ever...

Sometimes, I think the cards that folks use need to be grounded like this; attach a bare wire to the USB cable where it plugs into the card, if no hub is being used and attach the other to ground source.

Warren, I know this might not effect your setup, but if you're reducing things or going to reconfigure everything, you could go ahead and do it to prevent future issues.

John

[jackpilot]

Hi John
Attaching a ground wire to the USB cable....connect to what part of the USB cable? The metal casing that plugs in?
Jack

[Sam Llorca]

Good question Jack, I was about to ask the same thing but I was embarrassed.

[KyleH]

Be careful with this guys. If you start grounding USB ports everywhere your going to end up with ground-loops (not the aviation one) which will cause more problems than it solves.

The ground for the USB should be connected at the host computer. Best to take a multi-meter and see if the usb shield of the board you are concerned about is already connected to ground. If so leave it be.

[Trevor Hale]

This may explain some of my issues.  Flight sim randomly started hitting "F9" Virtual cockpit view all by itself the other day, and last night it Locks the computer "(Windows Key + L)" Randomly.  Not really sure where to try to find this issue at LOL.

[blueskydriver]

Hey Guys,

Yes, to the metal housing, BUT you must really know your USB cables, connectors and hubs here. You see, some hubs have shield grounding incorporated into the casing (as well as the USB port hubs inside a computer) by using a ferrite or a capacitor. It all depends who made it and how it's wired, as there are different schools of thought on grounding. The idea is to prevent EMI interference to the cable...

So, since my connections were being effected by disconnects, I did the grounding. However, I also grounded everything else (not all my cards, just the stuff in the pedestal) . Is it safe? I guess that depends on how you feel about it and the type of hub/USB you're using. I took the school of thought of chancing it I suppose.

If you look at USB wiring diagrams, you'll see that the shielding wire is called S-GND, so only connect to that and nothing else, since you have 5 volts inside the cable that you could short out with. Of course, I could tell you that you actually have a nominal voltage issue with your hub/USB and that is causing the disconnects/connects. Then, you might not ground anything...

The thing is, USB requires that the voltage be within a certain range, as well as the resistance in order for detection to be verified/continued. Thus, if you're placing your USB cable amongst many other cables that could pick EMI or add resistance by rolling/binding with plastic ties (which causes resistance), you could be causing the disconnects that way.

My grounding example is because inside my pedestal I have a hub, a couple of cards, GO Flight Radios and other power sources, so I figure my stray EMI levels were everywhere, along with the housing, so I gave it a try. Since it worked, I grounded the MIP frame, Overhead (Fwd & Aft) frames and the Yoke/Pedals platform. No more problems after this.

Please do note, you should only try this at your own risk, if you're willing to take a chance because everything else failed to work... Also, you can find many sources of info that will leave your head spinning, so do see this as an user choice decision.

John

[blueskydriver]

Take a look at this document:

http://www.ti.com/sc/docs/apps/msp/intrface/usb/emitest.pdf

Read below the EMI testing and look at how USB grounding to chassis and shielding is done.

John

Edit: I just want to point out that in a simulator build, think about all the electrical power around everywhere, as well as USB cable lengths, other cables near them, bundles of cables, straps, ties, clamps, binding by snaking through different areas and so on. In a normal environment an USB cable/hub works most times as they should, but inside a sim it's not normal usage...

Oh Warren, I didn't mean to highjack your post, but since I suggested these things to you, I wanted to make sure I didn't cause you any further, possibly, shocking issues with your USB/HUBS...

[FredK]

Hmmmm....I have been following this thread with curiosity since I never realized how pervasive dropped USB connections are. 

Perhaps I have been just lucky as has been suggested but there must be something unique about my setup.  Again, I essentially do not experince any dropped connections whatsoever....perhaps once a year or so my CPFlight MCP port gets reassigned for some reason and is is not recognized on bootup....but that is pretty much it.

Giving some further thought to it.....

My sim runs on 8 dedicated electrical circuits (we built the house new and I had extra dedicated circuits installed in the sim room)....perhaps that has something to do with it? The only other things I can think of are that (1) everything is plugged into Belkin surge protectors, (2) I only use high quality USB wiring, (3) no hubs whatsoever, (4) minimized USB distance runs as much as possible (but some are 15 feet), and (5) things are spread out over 7 computers (3 for avionics and 4 for visuals).  I have not taken care to specifically ground anything.

Fred K

[fsaviator]

Thanks John.

All good discussions.  Truthfully even with the crap wiring in my house I haven't had any USB issues since I moved here, mostly because I only have three hubs, and each is connected to a different computer.  They are cheap, 10 port hubs with 1.5A Power Supplies

My current setup is four computers: three for the sim (MIP and TQ, For and Aft OVHD, CDUs and Pedestal); one as an instructor station.  With three projectors and two Power supplies (one in the MIP and one in the Ovhd) I was blowing circuits even running on two different busses.  I ended up pulling the Power supplies and instead tapped in to the power on the PC Power supplies to run the MIP and Overhead.  It actually works well and reduced the load enough to keep everything running while using excess power from the PCs.

To make a long story shorter, I plan to remove the instructor station and use a laptop instead and now that I have a CPFLight pedestal I can eliminate another complete computer if I change my video feed to the CDUs to USB-VGA adapters.  This led me to needing reliable Hubs to feed the adapters.

I ended up getting a good deal on three Startech Industrial hubs.  They run on bus 7-40VDC so I can eliminate the plugs and run them on my 12V Power Supply.  I have two other Startech products (USB to RS232 adapter) and another hub and they are rock solid products so I opted for them.  I'll let you guys know how they work out.

[carlos hermida]

Thanks John.

All good discussions.  Truthfully even with the crap wiring in my house I haven't had any USB issues since I moved here, mostly because I only have three hubs, and each is connected to a different computer.  They are cheap, 10 port hubs with 1.5A Power Supplies

My current setup is four computers: three for the sim (MIP and TQ, For and Aft OVHD, CDUs and Pedestal); one as an instructor station.  With three projectors and two Power supplies (one in the MIP and one in the Ovhd) I was blowing circuits even running on two different busses.  I ended up pulling the Power supplies and instead tapped in to the power on the PC Power supplies to run the MIP and Overhead.  It actually works well and reduced the load enough to keep everything running while using excess power from the PCs.

To make a long story shorter, I plan to remove the instructor station and use a laptop instead and now that I have a CPFLight pedestal I can eliminate another complete computer if I change my video feed to the CDUs to USB-VGA adapters.  This led me to needing reliable Hubs to feed the adapters.

I ended up getting a good deal on three Startech Industrial hubs.  They run on bus 7-40VDC so I can eliminate the plugs and run them on my 12V Power Supply.  I have two other Startech products (USB to RS232 adapter) and another hub and they are rock solid products so I opted for them.  I'll let you guys know how they work out.

   Hi  Warren,

     I have  started to have some issues with my hub that connects all my overhead stuff in the last 15 days so I decided to try some industrial hubs too. I have ordered today one Startech and I want to know
how it goes yours ? Are you happy with it ?

  I ordered this model:

                StarTech.com Mountable Rugged Industrial 7 Port USB Hub (ST7200USBM)


     

[fsaviator]

Carlos,
for the most part I'm happy with them.  I bought them because they could be run on 12V and I planned to feed them off of my power supply instead of using the power adapter that comes with them.  In theory, that is a sound move,  but I found slight fluctuations in my power supply affect them so I went back to the power adapters.

I've since changed out my power supply but haven't had the time to test out the hubs off the PS again.

Warren

[tennyson]

Hi Warren,
I too, had USB problems and with the help of the group I bought hubs from USBFirewire. They did the trick.
Talk about heavy duty.

I was also told about the German made EXSYS brand. They are expensive but bulletproof, as well.





Frank Cooper

[RayS]

I too invested in an industrial USB hub and all my USB-related issues disappeared. No more random disconnects, reboots or errant events. Best move I ever made.

[727737Nut]

Are these industrial hubs TT capable?  It should say TT on th.e tag or in the manual.  If not I can't use them.  The non TT hubs share the data line and it could bog down your sim data transfer

[iwik]

Rob,
Yes one should really be looking for a Multi TT device as single TT cause bottle necks.
Looks like the best option is a usb hub with one TT for each port.
Les

[jackpilot]

TT=?

[fsaviator]

Transaction Translator

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/usb-technology,677-3.html

[RayS]

You still have a lot of USB 1.1 devices in your platform?

[carlos hermida]

  So updating... my new Startec 7ports USB Hub (industrial) for my overhead arrived yesterday and after install it I made a test of 2 hours and without any USB drop.
  Looks that all is very stable now, sometimes I can't believe that
some issues can be solved easy in our hobby...
   More tests in the way...just to be sure !