USB 2.0 VS 3.0 Hub

Hulk

Supreme [H]ardness
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I plan on installing a USB extension hub in my basement. I'm going to hook it up to my PC that's upstairs so that I can play PC games and watch movies from my PC.

My question is do I need a USB 2.0 or 3.0?
The only things I plan on hooking up to it are:

XBOX 360 controller
Mouse and keyboard wireless module
portable HDD to watch movies from

The reason why I am asking is because the 2.0 HUB is 50% cheaper than the 3.0 one.
 
No, for the uses you mention, there's no reason to buy a USB 3.0 hub. USB 3.0 is much faster, but the devices you hook up have to be USB 3.0 as well in order to take advantage of that faster standard. If all you are hooking up are USB 2.0 devices, a 3.0 hub would be wasted and just act as a 2.0 hub.
 
I would get a USB 3.0 hub because the price difference is sod all.
Then you are covered for a LONG time.

ps If you use the drive to watch a 4K movie you will need USB 3.0
 
I would get a USB 3.0 hub because the price difference is sod all.
Then you are covered for a LONG time.

ps If you use the drive to watch a 4K movie you will need USB 3.0

If he doesn't have any USB 3.0 ports on his PC, doesn't own any USB 3.0 capable devices, then a USB 3.0 hub is going to do sod all for him... and cost more. I'm also thinking he's not watching 4K content off of this portable HDD he mentioned. 720 or DVD resolution would play fine over USB 2.0.
 
His choice not yours.
WTF? He's just asking for advice. Yours makes no sense if he doesn't have a PC with USB 3.0 ports/USB 3.0 devices and he's wanting to avoid having to pay 50% more for it.

Hulk, another thing you may want to keep in mind is the max lengths for the cable runs are going to be pretty short. (From PC to the hub, and then hub to the device, the max length for each cable segment is going to be limited to around 5 meters (~16 feet) per the USB spec (so roughly a total reach of about 10 meters / ~32feetl.) If you need to go longer, you can daisy chain more than one USB powered hub... or invest in active cable extensions, but using more than one powered hub and daisy chaining them is typically the preferred solution, as active cable extensions tend to be a bit hit or miss at times.
 
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That hub is solid... note however that the hub is what extends from your PC, and then the USB extension cables then extends from the hub to a given device. Also those "Active" USB extension cables can also be very hit and miss as well, so I would avoid them if at all possible.

A better option would be to get 2 of these hubs: https://www.amazon.com/AmazonBasics-Port-USB-Power-Adapter/dp/B00DQFGJR4 ($18.99 each)

And then daisy chain them from your PC with 2 of these cables: https://www.amazon.com/AmazonBasics-USB-2-0-Cable-Male/dp/B00BCWALHM ($5.99 each) That would get you 32 feet from your PC.

And if you need more reach, then finally add however many of these you need to have each devices reach that second hub: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00NH11PEY/ref=psdc_464394_t2_B00NH136GE ($5.99 each)

So it would look something like this:

PC ---(16 foot USB cable)---> USB Hub1 ---(16 foot USB cable)---> USB Hub2 ----(Optional 9 foot USB cables)---> Your USB Device(s)

The above would get you 41+ feet of reach from your PC to your devices. Good luck!
 
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I have a usage case where this works. I have all my bluray optical drives in USB 2.0 enclosures. Old HP cases that I replaced the DVD optical drives with Bluray over time. So while each drive is USB 2.0, they plug into a USB 3 hub which plugs into a USB 3 port on the computer. This allows each optical drive to operate at it's full USB 2.0 capacity. So if I'm ripping/copying 2 discs at once, they are not limited to a combined bandwidth of ~30MB/s (if they went into a USB 2.0 hub). Instead they can each operate at ~30MB/s.
 
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