external hard drive - remove power from one of laptop's usb hubs

08
2014-07
  • user327911

    my laptop (hp probook 4530s - windows 8.1 x64) has 4 usb hubs; I attached 1TB external hard-drive to one of them and it works just fine;

    if i set the external hard-drive to offline mode then it's corresponding partition goes away and user no longer has access to it; but the external hard-drive still has it's power(it's led is on);

    is there anyway to disable the power of that usb hub that external hard-drive is attached to it?(I want to remove power from external hard-drive without physically detach it from laptop)

    • Answers
  • Shiki

    No. Unless you build a switch into your USB cable and turn that off by hand after removing the drive safely on your operating system.

  • Dave Rook

    Yes I think you can.

    Go to device manager and disable the USB

    You will have to work out which USB root hub corresponds to which USB port on your machine, but this should work.

    Failing that, the expensive option is to buy a new external drive with a power switch.


    • Related Question

    external hard drive - 2.0 speeds on USB hub?
  • Matthew Robertson

    How capable are USB hubs?

    I have an AirPort Extreme router with a printer attached (it's not powered by USB). I want to extend this and add two hard drives (one for Time Machine and the other for EyeTV recordings).

    Can a 4-port USB hub (I'm considering this one) achieve USB 2.0 speeds and power the hard drives? What difference would a self-powered vs externally-powered hub produce?


    • Related Answers
  • Radruler

    Ive run 3 external hds off a Belkin wall-powered hub and gotten the same speed as a direct connection, however my hard drives were all wall-powered as well. As a rule of thumb, it's definitely better to get powered USB hubs for any hard disk usage or heavy data access (bigger thumb drives, etc), while self/computer powered hubs are usually for mouse/keyboard and generally device inputs. There is no downside as far as I am aware of using a wall-powered hub, so if you have the extra cash, its always a good investment to go with external power. I personally use an old model of Belkin's hubs, and its served me well for almost 3 years now.

    tl;dr: Drawing usb power is bad for lots of data transfer, grab an externally/wall powered hub and you should be fine. Try and get the hard drives themselves powered too -- the less stress on the hub, the better.

  • Stefan Thyberg

    A self-powered USB Hub typically reinforces and repeats the signal so that you may have longer cables. It's definitely to be prefered when running heavy USB appliances such as harddrives.