Please, stay off my back. Or I will attack. And you don't want that.

[venta]

Does anyone know anything about USB hubs?

At work, I wish to plug in more devices than my laptop has USB slots. Usually I have plugged in:

1. A small portable HD
2. A USB mouse (OK, technically it's a USB trackball, but not to worry)
3. A keyboard, which is really PS2 but I have a decent converter.

I learned the hard way that at least (1) prevents me from using an unpowered hub.

So I bought this, which has two powered slots and five unpowered.

I expect (possibly wrongly) that (2) and (3) should be OK in unpowered slots. However! I often have issues where my keyboard/mouse stop working for a brief period (~10 seconds). During this time the laptop's built-in keyboard/mouse work fine. It's quite annoying.

Last week, I thought my HD had died, but I'm now cautiously optimistic that the problem was just that the hub wasn't powering it properly. When I plugged the HD in, its little blue light came up on but the disc didn't spin up. However, it seems to be behaving fine when plugged in directly to various different machines.

So... tell me, oh LJ, what do I need in the hub department? An ideal solution will Just Work with my three not-terribly-complicated peripherals, and will not take up very much space on my desk.

Comments

[timeplease.livejournal.com]

Try a good quality hub?

I have one of these (used with a PC, not a Raspberry) and it works very well.

[venta.livejournal.com]

I bought the original in a bit of a hurry, and the site I had checked it out on suggested it was a good quality one. Turns out it's merely pricey, though :)