Have strange problem USB

Hi All

I have a stange thing happing on USB extension cable. When I first got the K7 I load software and connect K7 to PC and all connected ok. But the recording quality was
simply alwful and I tried all the tweeks in Alec's excellent KN7 book but could never get anything like a reasonable recording.
So I have now bought a new PC and tested if by recording a CD track via Panasonic recorder and it is brilliant. I then connect the PC with the same extention lead it did not reconise the K7 so I connect the card reader and web cam to cable and still no good. Thought it must be the cable had been damaged so obtain a new extention cable and
it still does not work. It seems new PC can't handle a extention cable.
Is this possible ??
Any help would be appreciated as the reason for investing in a new pc was to record to CD

Many Thanks

Tony Looker

I'm afraid usb was never designed for long extension cables, and digital audio is the last thing you should put down a usb extension cable.

To extend reliably you need to use powered hubs, but I would not particularly recommend this for long usb audio runs either.

I realise that it's not the best way to do it
but why did it work on my old pc bot not on the new one ???

Tony Looker

entirley dependant on how much current your usb card can push down the cable, and whether this is enough to drive the signal without dropout over that length or not.

Beyond several metres usb is just not specified to work without powered hubs, so results will be pot luck depending on your individual hardware and length and quality of cabling.

Forgot to say that I have changed from windows 98 which reconized the K7 to windows XP.

I have no idea what you're talking about now. If you are now saying your xp does not recognise the 7k that's an entirely different question and will hardly contribute towards a usb extension cable working

What i'am saying is that under windows 98 on the old slow system it reconised KN7 and presumely would have reconised the card reader etc. but on new high spec PC with windows xp is does not reconised any thing on extention cable it does of course reconise my printer scanner etc on normal supplied USB cable so if I connect the card reader it reads it straight away but reconnect with extension cable and nothing happens at all.

Tony Looker

I'll repeat for the third time that usb is not designed to be used with long extension cables and results will vary depending on different hardware and other variables - that is assuming all the hardware, cables and software is working correctly in the first place.

I had word with the technical guy at PC world and he said that the power from the motherboard to USB could be lower on the new system than the old so recommended a powered
USB hub (as previously mention here) so I bought one and will (fingers crossed) try it out tonight.

Will let you know what happens

Please advise if this is ok to try on the K7
and I won't damage anything

Tony Looker

Wow, you found a guy at PC world who gave the same reason as my previous answer! that is progress of sorts I suppose.

Since it is not designed to be used in this way, whether it works will purely be a matter of luck.

Hi Tony I Had A similer problem with windows XP. I Had to reload the drivers, If you follow the instruction manual on the disk, And follow It word for word loading the drivers first then the application It works the instructions are in three langauges so you need to read it all the way through I do not use an extension cable but I tried it on a 3,metre cable and it worked fine hope this helps

Mally

I'm surprised you found someone at PC World who knew what a USB lead was

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Willum

Tony,
I have a Dell Pentium 4 computer and an old Compaq Laptop and both work without problems without a powered hub for the USB. In fact, I have used as much as nine feet of USB cable without problems.
I did have problems at first because of other software stealing processor time away from the USB transfer between the PC and KN7000. Windows XP is particularly bad for this as it is constantly checking for "this and that" on the system. The result is that it causes stuttering of the WAV or MP3 file that you are trying to generate. There has been quite a bit of discussion about this in the past on the forums. If you can't find the past information, contact me by EMail and I'll research it for you.
Regards,
Walt

nice one, Willum

3 metres or 9 feet is no problem at all since it is the limit for reliable operation for usb 1.1 with all peripherals. Some slow peripherals might work up to 5 metres, but no more can be guaranteed reliably without a powered hub.

The 7000 drivers specifically state they are not guaranteed to work via a hub; therefore whether it works or not will be a matter of luck depending on the particular hardware used.