forum.excito.com

Hi!

Compliments on the really nice HW & SW that is B3! Anyhow, I tried to attach an external USB drive (2.5" WD, just USB and no external power) and it this is what I see in dmesg:

[26436.898069] usb 1-1.2: new high speed USB device using orion-ehci and address 4
[26436.918650] hub 1-1:1.0: unable to enumerate USB device on port 2
[26470.694455] usb 1-1.2: new high speed USB device using orion-ehci and address 5
[26470.836038] usb 1-1.2: device descriptor read/all, error -71
[26470.865314] hub 1-1:1.0: unable to enumerate USB device on port 2
[26522.658439] usb 1-1.1: new high speed USB device using orion-ehci and address 7
[26522.780279] usb 1-1.1: device descriptor read/all, error -71

I suspect it *might* be that the USB ports do not give enough power to spin up the drive, although I am not really sure. Could be a different problem altogether... Nevertheless, it works with my laptop and I can also confirm that it does not spin up when hooked to B3. I am not sure what goes first though, so maybe it's not spinning up because of an earlier failure of something?

Thanks!

I had the same problem yesterday with a 2.5" external USB disk. It is self powered by my laptop but B3 had insufficient power to drive it. I ended up using a second USB to 5v power lead in the second b3 USB port to get it to work. I guess that the b3 can't deliver the full 500mA per port which I think is the USB2 spec.

Yes, the power supply for Bubba is already 2.5A, which is more than usual, but not enough to power two HDs. There's not much you can do about it except using separate power for the external HD.

Hm. The drive does not come with any other connections (just a single USB) and no external power supply or connector. So I guess though luck. I have sort of thought it would be easier to copy the data from the disk directly instead of going through a laptop and network... well, I guess I can go the more complicated route, afterall. Thanks for the info.

If you buy a powered USB hub you can connect that hd without any problems
.

This is really interesting since I'm really considering buying a B3.

My bubba2(no wifi) that came with a 3A power supply don't seem to have any problems whatsoever with supplying power to an external USB powered hard drive.
Would a more powerful power supply connected to B3 make a difference or is it the B3 itself that is the problem?

mornfall: maybe a USB extra power cable (y-cable) would do the trick, it's a cable that is used to provide high consuming usb peripherals when using USB 1.1(or previous), it uses two USB "outlets" to compensate for the lack of power.

I know there was some kind of plans to maybe sometime prepare Bubba2 to use a USB 3g dongle as WAN, and as far as I know, those dongles can also be pretty power consuming.

I am pretty sure the specification of Usb 2.0 should allow an output of 500mA, at least thats what I always take for granted.

A statement from Excito regarding this would be most appreciated.

/Harry

This sounds strange, the USB port is designed for 500 mA (autofuse shuts off at 750mA after 1 minute), and this is measured and verified. I'll grab one from production and re-do this measurement, just in case, but my guess is that it's something else (sw?), or that your USB disks surge too much power?

I'l double check and get back. Meanwhile, I would appreciate if someone could measure the actual voltage on the USB? Does it drop below 4,6V when you insert the disk? I haven't been able to reproduce the problem here, but I'll try with more disks.

Any results yet?

/Harry

We have measured and checked 500 mA supply from both ports, no problem. Have ordered a 2.5" disk as well, will try as soon as it gets here.

I was just thinking. I had the same problem trying to power an external USB 2 disk which is self-powered on all other equipment. I also have the wireless B3 model though. Could it be the wireless that is affecting it? I did manage to power the disk with a Y cable though.

philgaskin wrote:I was just thinking. I had the same problem trying to power an external USB 2 disk which is self-powered on all other equipment. I also have the wireless B3 model though. Could it be the wireless that is affecting it? I did manage to power the disk with a Y cable though.

without owning a B3 wifi yet, I do hope that there is a simple way to turn off the wifi (security aspect etc.)
And if so, then there should be no problem to test your theory.

Yes, wifi can of course be turned off. Howver I doubt this has anything to do with it, shouldnt be connected in any way. Give me a few more days and I'll try to figure this out.

I connected my unpowered WD passport 500GB drive to my B3 and it works perfectly. This of course does not solve your problem but it at least shows that it is not a systemic issue.

Ubi

Thanks Ubi for letting us know.

Ubi wrote:I connected my unpowered WD passport 500GB drive to my B3 and it works perfectly. This of course does not solve your problem but it at least shows that it is not a systemic issue.

Ubi

Does Your B3 have wifi?

/Harry