Cumulus Support

My weather station came without a USB lead, and in any case probably any supplied lead would be too short for what I want,

I understand it's a USB A to A lead. Is there any special wiring, or will something generic such as this http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/270564008791 do the trick? Also I understand it is possible to have longer runs, up to 30m in total, as long as there's a USB hub every 5m - would this have to be powered?

Sorry for all the questions! Thanks for any help!

Hi,

Yes, that USB cable should be fine, Much longer and probably better than the one supplied by FO which can radiate interference into the Console.

In principle, you can use "Active" USB extension cables (or hubs every 5 - 10 metres which might be cheaper), but I'd avoid too many (I've never tried chaining more than one) not just because they're quite pricey. It may be necessary to use a powered hub towards the end of the "chain" if you do use about three or more active stages.

Cheers, Alan.

Thank you.

I did a lot of work with extended USB cables in my work. Anything over 5 metres that is not powered will give intermittent results. You can buy USB extenders that allow you to send USB over network cabling that comply with Cat5e standards but we found those to be unreliable over 20 metres.
We did find a way to do it over longer distances and get very good results with fibre optic cables but they are expensive for home use see here http://www.amplicon.com/Data-Comms/prod ... SB-125.cfm

I got a 5m lead and a 5m extension lead, and a USB hub.

The extension lead is very good quality; it has foil and braid screening, which I think is amazing for £1.25.

I plugged the hub directly into the PC, and it worked. Plugged it into the end of the 5m extension lead, and I got "USB device not recognised." Bugger. So just out of interest, I tried the weather station via its own 5m lead and the 5m extension lead without any hub. It worked flawlessly.

So I'm now connected through a wall via the 5m lead and the 5m extension lead, which I chopped in half so I could push it through the hole I drilled in the wall, cut to exact length and soldered back together again. It connects absolutely fine.

Which is totally counter what "should" happen but I'm not complaining!!

kingqueen wrote:Plugged [the hub] into the end of the 5m extension lead, and I got "USB device not recognised."
Which is totally counter what "should" happen

Hi,

Yes, that's why I was reluctant to recommend "daisy-chaining" too many cables together.

However, if the hub has a significantly long (input) cable, then I believe what "should" be done is to plug the hub directly into the PC and the extension cable into the hub, so that the "active electronics" acts as a "repeater" near the middle of the total cable length.

Cheers, Alan.