help request for usb hub failure
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Hello, if anyone can help me, I'd be very grateful.
I use a usb hub to connect a keyboard, flash drives and my printer to the laptop. (I use it every day for research, so this is a bit urgent.)
I did have difficulties with the maximum power of my usb ports in the past, see here.
What happened today is that my hub is just not working. The hub's LED flashes and I can't connect any device to the laptop regardless of which port I use. Interestingly, the hub is working fine under Win XP which I have installed paralelly.
So, who has got an idea to get the hub working again?
Best regards
anatom
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Have you tried testing this from a livecd? I'd suggest doing that first. Not much point messing about with software if there might be something wrong with the hardware that is only appearing in GNU/Linux.
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Thank you for the suggestion.
I don't have any live cd that works allright. Installed trisuel with much effort via text based installation from a 5.0 Live CD and upgraded via update manager to 5.5. I tried to download more recent live cds and to burn it several times but it just didn't work.
OK, so as a next step, I'll browse the forum and issues once again trying to find some ideas how to make a Live CD that works.
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I have more problems with my two usb ports.
As my hub fails, I have connected the keyboard and the mouse directly to the laptop. After I plug them out, my usb flash drives are not recognized when I plug these in---in either port.
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While mouse and keyboard are functioning properly on the very same ports?
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Hi Chris, thank you very much for your help, and a Happy New Year 2013!
It's been a while but I'm back since the hub resp. my usb ports are still bothering me.
Yes, it's well possible (for me, as a lay person) that it's the ports, not the hub, or both?
How can I find out?
(By the way, I tried the live CDs both Desktop and Mini, 5.5. When the hub didn't work under my installed system, it didn't work in both live systems either. And when I tried to use it after it had been working fine on the installation, I couldn't boot from the live CDs anymore...
Actually, they functioned only once, immediately after I had burnt them. Now two days later I cannot boot from either of them which adds further my marvel at the wondrous ways computers work ;-) )
As always, I'd appreciate any help!
Have a nice day,
Anatom
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The flash does sometimes does not work when it is connected to the USB port?
The flash drive sometimes does not work when it is connected to the USB hub?
If the answer is yes to both of these I'd blame the USB ports. You might want to try some other devices as well. See if it is just the USB flash drive.
Getting some consistency is probably a good start.
If there was a point when the flash drive worked (with an older distribution/different distribution/different OS) I'd probably try testing it with that again (if possible) and see if it is still being unreliable.
I tend to replace hardware when things start to fail. It just isn't worth the time and energy to put too much into it. Hardware is being made cheaper and cheaper. Particularly post 2000. Even if it isn't free of cost it will ultimately fail. The chemicals used to make hardware last were outlawed by the European Union. It doesn't mean everything fails immediately although it does mean older hardware is pretty much guaranteed to fail sooner and don't ever expect hardware to last 20 years. While a system 20 years ago might still be ticking today much more of what was made just 10 years ago is already dead.
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Thanks for your reply!
The answers are: yes -- yes.
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Description:
Mouse, keyboard and printer always work when connected to the port.
When the USB hub fails, all devices fail when they are connected to the /hub/ (mouse, keyboard, printer and flash drive). In this case, keyboard, printer and mouse work while the flash drive fails when connected to the /port/.
When the USB hub works, all devices, including the flash drives, are working directly on the /ports/ and on the /hub/.
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I never had any problems connecting USB flash drives running Ubuntu. If I remember correctly, the problem started with flash drives not being recognized when connected to the /port/ after I had changed to Trisquel a couple of months ago.
When shutting down while the /hub/ was failing, I recently observed an error message scrolling up the screen "Unable to enumerate USB device" or something like that.
I have installed WinXP in the same machine. When the /hub/ is failing in Trisquel and flash drives are failing on both the hub and the ports, everything is working in Win XP, the hub itself as well as the flash drive on both the hub and the ports.
I don't understand why how this could be a hardware failure.
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My system is an IBM Thinkpad T40 with a 1.5GHz pentium CPU; I'm not sure when it was build. I have the feeling it's a quite reliable machine.
What should I do now? Do you have an idea?
(Sorry for any language errors, I'm not a native speaker.)
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Hi Chris, you said it's probably a hardware failure. Is there a way I can find out on my own? Someone in the ubuntu-irq said I should run dmesg which I did, but I didn't understand the command output. I'm not experienced in these issues ...
Thanks in advance.
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That is probably true. dmesg might report errors. I'm not entirely sure though what would appear vs if it was working properly. Though I could theorize on possible explanations. Could be a power issue for example. If the hub is unpowered (?) for instance there may be some limitation where a device could be drawing more power than the USB port will give. Or the combination of components draws too much power. A powered hub would solve that. So might a device that has multiple connectors if you connect it to two separate USB ports where the ports are not just a hub. Laptops for instance will have two US ports on a hub. Connecting the cable on one port and then on a different port on the other side of the machine for instance would then solve the problem probably.
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Thanks for the explanation!
I decided to run "trial and error" and bought a pcmcia card with four usb-plugs. I hope that'll do.
I also had thought of a power issue and connected my devices differently, so that no port is demanded more than the 0.5 mA (or what ever the true value is) it can give. However, the hub also fails when it is the only device connected to my system via usb.
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Chris, thanks againg for the suggestion of a hardware failure. I am using the pcmcia usb card bus, and any device is being detected and working fine so far.
It's a card with four usb ports. How much power does each port have? How can I find out?
I don't know if it is something with the Kernel (and the drivers), but I have the same problem (well almost). It seems to be something that happen only with USB Hub devices (I've tested 4 different and with the same problem). It is like they mess up with the order (or just can't organize the transmission of information) and after some times it stops working, or becomes slow.
Maybe someone should report this. But where and how ?
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So, during the last three weeks, everything has been working fine so far. Keyboard and mouse are still in the usb ports, and I connect my flash drives via the usb card bus. And the hub connects properly to the card bus!
Again, thank you for giving me the hint at the hardware failure, Chris.
@aliasbody: I also had the impression you described, but in the end it /was/ the hardware failure.
I am going to close the corresponding issue (https://trisquel.info/en/issues/6926) as well.
anatom
Here are my two cents to reinforce Christ previous comments; see the attached link for more information.
http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/10things/10-things-you-should-know-about-usb-20-and-30/1265