24th May 2006
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#1 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Jul 2004 Location: OH/Columbus
Posts: 4,793
Thread Starter  | Rackmount USB Hub? 16+ Ports?
I'm really tired of small 4-8 port usb hubs that each require their own wall wart power supply, and don't really work well in the cabling scheme in my studio.
Is anyone aware of a 16+ port USB 2.0 hub that uses a standard AC plug for power? It doesn't seem to be that hard to make, but I can't find anything like it with Googling (maybe I'm just not seeing it). About 4 ports on the front and 12 on the back would rock.
(If anyone is wondering why I need so many USB ports, just figure that a USB keyboard controller, an AMT 8, Unitor 8, Akai S-5000, XS-key, printer, iLoks, Nord Modulars, etc... take a lot of ports when it comes down to it). Also my current USB hub is constantly running out of power with so many devices. Thank god that Firewire can daisy-chain, although I wouldn't be opposed to seeing a FW400/800 one too.
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24th May 2006
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#2 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Jun 2004 Location: An Australian in London
Posts: 5,503
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I've emailed Belkin and a bunch of other people over the last few years asking for this.
The response, when I get one, is always "too niche".
I'd love a 16 port USB2 and 8 port Firewire 800, 8 port Fw400 combined hub.
That is what I keep requesting.
JR
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"I don't go to mythical places with strange men." Douglas Adams
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24th May 2006
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#3 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Jul 2004 Location: OH/Columbus
Posts: 4,793
Thread Starter |
It doesn't seem like it would be THAT hard to build one of these. I haven't ever tried to do such, but it seems that there's probably something in the Digikey or Mouser catalogue that could be built on.
If i made a few dozen of these that worked pretty well, would anyone be interested?
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25th May 2006
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#4 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Mar 2006 Location: US | Quote: |
Originally Posted by Tibbon It doesn't seem like it would be THAT hard to build one of these. I haven't ever tried to do such, but it seems that there's probably something in the Digikey or Mouser catalogue that could be built on.
If i made a few dozen of these that worked pretty well, would anyone be interested? |
I would be interested if you made them powered. FW daisy-chains well but USB is another story.
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Justin Justice
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6th January 2007
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#5 | | Gear nut
Joined: Nov 2005 Location: St. Croix, US Virgin Islands
Posts: 107
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I know this is an older thread, but I've been looking for one of these for a long time. I found one a few months ago on some computer networking company's site but couldn't find any ordering info for it. I even did a google search using the product number but nothing else turned up. The company made some specialized KVM type gear but that's about all I can remember.
With things like control surfaces, iloks, dongles, midi controllers (several!), mouse, cooling pad (I use a powerbook), interfaces etc, all fighting for USB ports it's a pain having to disconnect something to make way for something else, and then having the dreaded USB bus crash and having to power down, power up, replug etc to get it going again.
hopefully, someone else will see this thread and know of a good rackmount usb hub.
Dave-G
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6th January 2007
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#6 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Jul 2004 Location: OH/Columbus
Posts: 4,793
Thread Starter |
I still want one of these. Maybe later today I'll research into how to make them. If I make up 50-100 of them, would anyone want to buy them if they are reasonably priced? I'd think around what... $75-100 bucks or so would sound right for a 16-24 port USB powered hub?
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6th January 2007
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#7 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Jul 2004 Location: OH/Columbus
Posts: 4,793
Thread Starter |
One major problem seems to be that there aren't m(any?) 16+ port hub controller chipsets. One could always daisy chain a few 4-5 port chipsets, but I'm worried about clocking and stability problems for some of us using MIDI USB gear. Latency couldn't matter a bit for something like an iLok or XSKey, but for an AMT8, i wouldn't want it sitting at the end of a 4th daisy chain.
Anyone know of any chipsets? I'll pull out the mouser catelog later.
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7th January 2007
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#8 | | Gear nut
Joined: Nov 2005 Location: St. Croix, US Virgin Islands
Posts: 107
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count me in tibbon! I might even need 2 of them (one mobile, one studio) I'm willing to go up to $125 each. It would just be nice to get rid of the clutter and have something rack mounted instead of these desktop hubs, especially for a mobile rig!
Dave-G
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9th January 2007
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#9 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Aug 2003 Location: USA
Posts: 702
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Switchcraft makes something like this... it's a completely empty and configurable patchbay where you can add USB, Firefire, ADAT lightpipe, etc to the bays... I don't know what the system is called, but you should be able to find on they website. A Switchcraft sales manager had shown it to me about a year ago...
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Best Wishes,
GearGuy
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17th May 2008
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#10 | | Gear maniac
Joined: Jul 2004
Posts: 169
| almost found one
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17th May 2008
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#11 | | Gear Head
Joined: Apr 2008 Location: London
Posts: 41
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19th May 2008
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#12 | | Gear Head
Joined: May 2006 Location: Chicago
Posts: 63
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The Switchcraft product is called the EH Series. You buy a blank 1RU 1x16 panel (QGPK1B440) or a 2RU 2x16 panel (QGPK2B440), then fill it with any of the modular connectors including USB, Firewire, Etc. Here's the link... Switchcraft
You can have them special ordered at any Guitar Center, or buy them from one of many on-line retailers like Sweetwater, Vintage King, Etc.
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20th May 2008
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#13 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Jul 2004 Location: OH/Columbus
Posts: 4,793
Thread Starter | Quote:
Originally Posted by chezero  The Switchcraft product is called the EH Series. You buy a blank 1RU 1x16 panel (QGPK1B440) or a 2RU 2x16 panel (QGPK2B440), then fill it with any of the modular connectors including USB, Firewire, Etc. Here's the link... Switchcraft
You can have them special ordered at any Guitar Center, or buy them from one of many on-line retailers like Sweetwater, Vintage King, Etc. |
Only thing begin that these seem to just make repeaters/extension patchbays out of them. I'm thinking about a hub that you could plug 16 devices into, and only one cable out of to your computer. But it's very close kinda
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20th May 2008
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#14 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Jul 2004 Location: OH/Columbus
Posts: 4,793
Thread Starter | Quote:
Originally Posted by thewolfman | Only downside here is you have to daisy chain and waste a ton of ports in doing so and it won't really provide more power without wall warts, etc. They look sweet however
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20th May 2008
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#15 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Dec 2005 Location: Sherman Oaks | Quote:
Originally Posted by Tibbon Only downside here is you have to daisy chain and waste a ton of ports in doing so and it won't really provide more power without wall warts, etc. They look sweet however | And they are only USB 1.1 not 2.... 
Been looking for this solution for years...Still waiting
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21st May 2008
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#16 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Jun 2005 Location: Columbus, Ohio
Posts: 2,706
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This seems like something BlackBox would make but I didn't see anything on their website. If you really want to find one you might try calling them and see if they have a solution.
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18th November 2008
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#18 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Jan 2007 Location: Oxnard
Posts: 1,032
| Quote:
Originally Posted by chezero The Switchcraft product is called the EH Series. You buy a blank 1RU 1x16 panel (QGPK1B440) or a 2RU 2x16 panel (QGPK2B440), then fill it with any of the modular connectors including USB, Firewire, Etc. Here's the link... Switchcraft
You can have them special ordered at any Guitar Center, or buy them from one of many on-line retailers like Sweetwater, Vintage King, Etc. |
Bingo! Thanks for the tip! This is what I need to get my life/studio untangled! Now if they only made em with Firewire 800!!!!
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4th February 2009
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#19 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Sep 2008 Location: Southern UT
Posts: 1,289
| Quote:
Originally Posted by Tibbon I still want one of these. Maybe later today I'll research into how to make them. If I make up 50-100 of them, would anyone want to buy them if they are reasonably priced? I'd think around what... $75-100 bucks or so would sound right for a 16-24 port USB powered hub? | Did this ever happen?
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4th February 2009
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#20 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Jul 2004 Location: OH/Columbus
Posts: 4,793
Thread Starter |
Nope. I've got some time on my hands now... maybe I can look again into these. There's clearly at least some small demand. I just fear that as soon as I start making them that someone in China will start making them for 1/10th the cost, but such is life.
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8th March 2009
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#21 | | Lives for acid
Joined: Dec 2008 Location: Me!bourne, Australia
Posts: 1,924
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+1 for me! I just googled for one and this thread came up LOL
Oh and PS you needn't worry about timing issues with MIDI via USB and/or USB hubs. MIDI data transfer rate is a little under 32kbps and even crappy ole USB 1.1 does 1.5mbps and a USB hub will not slow down data transfer - USB spec creates a direct connection between your USB bus and the device. The hub is essentially transparent as far as data transfer is concerned. You'd get bottleneck lag if you had a whole bunch of USB hard drives hanging off the hub at the same time, but if you do that you're... well, let's just say DON'T DO THAT. You could safely have MIDI clock and CC info going to 450+ devices at once. Or about 15,000 devices with USB 2.0  e e
In theory!
Oh, and if you have a PC or Mac Pro, you can get PCI/PCI-e cards with up to 5 USB ports on them. No help to us iMac suckers however.
__________________ Quote:
Originally Posted by Alan Parsons I've always been a believer in musical repetition to draw in the listener and make the music hypnotic.
Another thing I believe in is repetition. | | |
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6th April 2009
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#22 | | Gear interested
Joined: Apr 2009
Posts: 1
| 49-port USB Hub
Hi all.
Although I am a private musician with a small home studio, my reply to this thread is about the USB-2 hub.
If this is something that musicians are likely to need, with the emergence of ILok and similar dongles, then I believe I could help.
I am a member of a small engineering team, based in Cambridge, that have developed a few niche products such as this. Notably we have successfully designed a 49-port USB-2 hub used for professional/testing applications (images available), though with sufficient demand we could trim the cost-to-channels ratio if there were sufficient demand and justification for it. EDIT: FYI... A couple of image links:
Due to security restrictions, pleae right-click and save. http://www.funkyjive.com/usb49/IMG_2036.jpg http://www.funkyjive.com/usb49/IMG_2076.jpg
As used by a manufacturer to custom program/test their USB dongles. Producing something along similar lines with any number of reduced (or increased) ports wouldn't be an issue, although setup costs and demand would dictate whether it were financially viable, and the final cost to build & supply. Alternative interfaces (e.g. Firewire, ethernet, etc) are all equally possible, though would first need to be properly spec'd out before we could give it serious development time and costings.
All the best,
FunkyJive.
Last edited by FunkyJive; 6th April 2009 at 08:47 PM..
Reason: Added Image
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12th April 2009
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#23 | | Gear interested
Joined: Nov 2007 Location: Chicago
Posts: 20
| Rackmount USB Hub
I too have been wanting something like this for quite some time. Is there any manufacturer that has a fully developed product ready to buy. Do I still have to put it together myself? I rather just buy one.
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12th April 2009
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#24 | | Moderator
Joined: Jan 2004 Location: New Zealand/Switzerland/guitar case
Posts: 8,944
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Originally Posted by FunkyJive though with sufficient demand we could trim the cost-to-channels ratio if there were sufficient demand and justification for it. | I think about 24 connectors would be about right.
Make sure to orient them so that things like iloks have a enough space (probably orient the ports at a right angle to the row of connectors)
I'd buy one at the right price (similar to buying a number of other devices)
narco
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29th June 2009
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#25 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Jan 2007 Location: Oxnard
Posts: 1,032
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BUMP! Any developments anyone would like to share?
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4th July 2009
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#26 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Jul 2004 Location: OH/Columbus
Posts: 4,793
Thread Starter |
I was talking with a friend the other day that has some project management experience with this type of stuff. He thought it might be easy to get together. I've gotta figure this out....
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26th August 2009
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#27 | | Lives for gear
Joined: Feb 2009 Location: Lancashire, England
Posts: 2,118
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I probably wouldn't need one that big but it seems like you own quite a few. I've just got a D-Link 7 port and it's crap. Not enough power for even 2 bus powered devices when plugged in. Any recommendations?
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1st November 2009
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#28 | | Gear maniac
Joined: Feb 2009
Posts: 228
| Quote:
Originally Posted by zmallory | I checked this website out... Turns out they make a similar product with surge protection. It also comes with it's own rack-mounting kit!!! And a big plus is that all the connections are in the rear... I don't like to see my cables that I never move so being able to hide them will be awesome. I'm buying one. http://www.qualitycables.com/productdetails1.cfm?sku=USBG-7DU2i&cats= | |
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11th November 2009
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#29 | | Gear nut
Joined: Apr 2008
Posts: 124
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..any new/updates on this?
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21st December 2009
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#30 | | Gear interested
Joined: Dec 2009 Location: Indianapolis
Posts: 8
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Well I've got a design I would like to shop around , but till then maybe these will do ....
1. A 10 port power strip type layout :  Welcome to Usb.brando.com
Possible cons : not sure a lot of dongles would fit side by side . Not sure thats enough power for some of these types of devises ?
Pros : Cheap $25.00 . 10 #$&!ng ports !
2. USB Super 16-Port Hub  Welcome to Usb.brando.com
Possible cons : ugly as sin ( who cares ) a/b switch might kill an OS ( not what we want it for though ) .
High price . $140.00 !
Pros : 16 USB ports . Looks like it pulls enough power for what ever you through at it
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