Seeking input/suggestion for USB reliability improvements

Hardware Hub Other Hardware
1

Full disclosure, I posted this on another forum looking for answers but figured I may run into some more Niche knowledgeable users on this forum, or simply more exposure for more brain power! Please see post below…

Background info: I am currently running a standing desk setup with the desktop being wall mounted to reduce the weight on the desk itself, also I am sure there is no room on the desk for the tower with my monitor setup. As the computer is on the wall, this necessitates the use of long display cables, roughly 15ft, to allow them to reach from the PC, down the wall in the cable manager, and back up to the desk with enough slack for the up and down movement of the desk.
The same can be said about any USB devices. I have two USB 3.0 powered hubs (Product I purchased Amazon.com *Amazon link only for reference, and not for advertising ) mounted on the underside of the desk. One is on the back side of the desk, one on the front, both using 10 foot USB Type C extenders. The rear hub has the Vocaster Two, Arctis headset Dac, Keyboard, and mouse connected to it. The front USB hub has typically a secondary logitech camera, and the stream deck connected to it.
The Elgato Face Cam is connected with a dedicated active (powered) USB 3.0 extension cable as part of my previous troubleshooting efforts. (Amazon.com *again, link only for reference, not advertising )

System Specs:
Asus Prime Z690 -P motherboard with Intel i9 12900k
3090ti FE
64GB DDR5 RAM

The issues: I have been chasing some issues down for a while, spending money here and there for fixes, etc. The two main issues have to do with my Elgato items, Stream Deck Gen 1, and Elgato FaceCam (the 1080P 60fps model).

The stream deck on ocassion will just light up, but refuse to connect to the stream deck software when connected to the front most hub under the desk. When this happens I can connect it to the rear hub, and it then functions as intended, except then I experience unbearable input lag. Pressing a stream deck button to change to a different folder, perform an action, etc, can be delayed by sometimes 5 seconds or more, which is an eternity when it typically responds within a fraction of a second when operating correctly.

The Facecam while streaming will frequently lock up, which Deactivating and reactivating it in OBS usually brings it back up, but having to do this hourly or more is getting really old. Sometimes I will have to completely disconnect the cable from the back of the cam and reconnect it to get it back up and running.

Both of these devices to my understanding recommend against using extensions or hubs, and in my opinion that is primarily due to signal loss when using unpowered hubs, or passive extension cables causing voltage drop over distance.

My thought behind the Powered USB hubs, and the Powered active cable is that this would solve that issue, which for the most part it has from my previous hard locks/shutdowns, but they are starting to pop back up. The only other thing I have thought is that it could be a deeply rooted OS issue as I notice some other nit picky items here and there outside of USB issues, but for this thread we’ll assume they are unrelated unless I get some compelling info to advise otherwise. I should also note I do plan on reformatting my OS soon, but have been putting it off due to running two Windows operating systems, one for work from home and one for gaming/personal use, and I typically do NOT observe the issues while booted into my work OS. I work in IT so even my personal OS is kept fairly clean and void of sketchy applications, but that’s not to say Windows doesn’t just slowly kill itself over time warranting a fresh install from time to time.

To add onto this, if this is likely a USB power issue, maybe the two hubs don’t have adequate power? The AC to DC supplies are rated at 5V 2A each hub. Maybe I need a hub that can deliver more power per USB port? Maybe one specifically designed to run over extended USB (Have not found any)?

Additional info and advice is appreciated on potential fixes for these issues before I opt for the reformatting option.

Thanks -Xander

2

Not trying to bump too often, but I am curious if anyone has any suggestions? One thought I had was to try and use my front USB hub for one of the connections as it has a dedicated Sata power connection used inside the case. Assuming it’s a power related issue with USB specifically, this may supply more power through usb than the onboard USB?

I am getting a little out of my element when trying to find power ratings for onboard USB ports considering Asus doesn’t make this easy to find.

My next thought is to start mapping out the USB devices and what hubs they report as with USBlogview to see if I am running into an issue of too many hub hops in the system but I doubt it.

3

You state you don’t notice this behaviour with one of the two OS’s installed - you already have a test software environment. See if you can replicate the usage (even just the load) and see if you can cause the devices to drop out similarly. If not, the standard OS may at least have a different driver version or at least, something to target short of a shot in the dark reinstall.

For isolation purposes, connect your devices as directly to the system as you can (cut out the middlemen hub/ cables, for testing) and see if the behaviour is recurring. Try other USB ports with slower speed (could be, it’s trying to sync at a higher rate than it can really handle, and is resetting; could be device power settings, I can cause mice to flake out with too aggressive power save).

Could also affected with BIOS configurations, dial back any usb settings for test.

This might not be the tool I’d want ideally, but does usbview observe any devices dropping or indicate any other device behaviour that seems suspect.

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/drivers/debugger/usbview

Create as narrow a case as you can put together (does it work in the simplest case at all), and if so what do you then add that causes it to fail; then to gather data - usblogview (which you note) is an option to work on this.

4

You can check voltages with one of these little testers.

Probably already done but check for a BIOS update.

In device manager select the device with the issue then switch to view>devices by connection. Check the power management tab of upstream USB device(s) and uncheck “Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power”.

I have a focusrite Scarlett 2i2 audio interface that randomly disconnects sometimes a dozen times a day, sometimes once a week… I recommend that nobody buy these things because if you’re going to have a problem with a USB device it’ll be with these. After trying every USB cable I own with every port on my system to no avail I recently stumbled on the following tweak that seems to have fixed it.

Check your BIOS for a PCI setting that controls power saving modes. It’ll probably have options like: L0, L0s, L1, L0sL1 … you want L0 which is no power saving.

These are just some wild shots in the dark… YMMV