Help with USB 1.0 and 2.0

[bpesta22]

Hello

I have a 2 year old computer with USB ports. I guess they are the older 1.0 versions.

Just bought a color printer that requires USB 2.0

My 1.0 usb cable wont plug into it.


Right now, I have a digital camera and cable modem plugged into my USB ports.


Can anyone suggest the best way to get my color printer, camera and modem hooked up to my puter.

Do I have to upgrade to 2.0? Is there just a converter I could buy so that the printer would plug into the older port.

And, if so, can i swap-- using the same USB cable-- back and forth between the printer and the digital camera?

TIA

B

 

[shanek]

You need a USB 2.0 cable. You do not need to upgrade your computer to USB 2.0, but be aware that your USB 2.0 peripherals will run at USB 1.1 speeds.

 

[woodguard]

[ but be aware that your USB 2.0 peripherals will run at USB 1.1 speeds.

This is not realy true. Some usb 2 will work on 1.x but not all. Usb 2 is not totally downward compatable to 1.x.

Usb 1.x and 2.0 have the same plug on the computer side. The usb 2 cable has more shielding and little else.

A usb 2 card for your computer is only 50 Canadian, what's that in US ~$30. And you need extra plug anyway.

Done waist you money on a hub, thay are not totally compatiable with all devices.

 

[bpesta22]

Thanks guys.

Well, what should I do?

will the upgrade make my cable modem run faster??

If I dont upgrade, do i need three cables-- I rarely use the digital camera, so I was hoping to just swap it back n forth with the usb cable i use for the printer

Is that stupid?

 

[ceptimus]

You can upgrade the PC to USB 2 for not many bucks. they sell kits for it at PC stores. Pretty easy to do - just like installing a new graphics or sound card. It will make the USB 2 things, like your printer, (possibly) work a bit faster, but the old USB 1.1 stuff should still work as well.

I guess even USB 1.1 is not the bottleneck to your modem, unless you have some ultra-broad-band stuff. But I would use ethernet for connecting to a cable modem anyway - assuming the modem has an ethernet port.

 

[shanek]

will the upgrade make my cable modem run faster??

USB 1.1 runs at 12Mbps (well actually a little less due to overhead, but still). You'll be doing really, really good to get data off your cable modem at one third that speed. So, no.

If I dont upgrade, do i need three cables-- I rarely use the digital camera, so I was hoping to just swap it back n forth with the usb cable i use for the printer

No, not if the printer and the camera both use the same version of USB.

 

[thrombus29]

And if you are running Win XP you have to have Service Pack 1 installed for the USB 2 to be supported by the OS.

 

[Brian]

Thanks guys.

Well, what should I do?

will the upgrade make my cable modem run faster??

If I dont upgrade, do i need three cables-- I rarely use the digital camera, so I was hoping to just swap it back n forth with the usb cable i use for the printer

Is that stupid?

I'm not quite sure, but I think there is some advantage to using an ethernet card instead of USB for your cable modem. Ethernet card is $15.
I might be wrong though.

 

[Beanbag]

I'm not quite sure, but I think there is some advantage to using an ethernet card instead of USB for your cable modem. Ethernet card is $15.
I might be wrong though.

I've used a USB to Ethernet adapter ( USB 2.0 compliant) to let me connect my somewhat wheezy old HP laptop to the internet through the home network. Access was always a bit slower than my new laptop with the built-in 10/100 connection, but I passed it off as a processor speed difference. The real eye-opener came when I tried to download all the music files from the old laptop onto the network so I could have the same selections on all machines. The new laptop dumped about 20 hours worth of WAV files in less than eight minutes to the network share drive. The old laptop took over fifty minutes to do the same with only 15 hours worth. Too much of a difference to be the processor speed differential.

Went out and spent $40 US on a PC Cardbus Ethernet adapter. Download and upload times shrank back to the 8-9 minute level. The jump to and from USB was the bottleneck. Of course, that's on file transfers over the network. I do notice a slight but welcome improvement in page download times on the web.

Your results may vary.

Regards;
Beanbag

 

[shanek]

I'm not quite sure, but I think there is some advantage to using an ethernet card instead of USB for your cable modem. Ethernet card is $15.
I might be wrong though.

It's only faster, more reliable, and works with a greater variety of systems (including if you want to upgrade to, say, a Linksys router later). Other than that, I can't think of any reason at all.

 

[Brian]

It's only faster, more reliable, and works with a greater variety of systems (including if you want to upgrade to, say, a Linksys router later). Other than that, I can't think of any reason at all.

So like Shane says, don't bother with ethernet. Try to run your cable modem through the audio in jack on your sound card.