If you have an older computer with only one or two USB ports you know my pain. The desktop that I used to use only had two but when I looked at the device manager it said that there were four. I have no idea what that means and I never bothered to try and figure it out. I knew that I needed a USB expander but I was worried that it would fry out my aging desktop. When I got an awesome deal on my Acer 5515 [thanks to a pricing snafu at Wal-Mart] I knew I could no longer put off the inevitable; I had to get something to give me more USB ports. I started looking online for something that would work with my specific needs. What needs? Oh, I'm glad you asked.

I need USB ports for my mouse [and the wireless keyboard that I bought but used only three times], webcam, printer, broadband connection, ZIP drive and scanner. Sure, I don't need to have some of those things hooked up all the time but I found that if they aren't plugged in when I start up the laptop they might not get recognized when I plug them into the USB port and that means restarting.

Most of the USB hubs that I found online were in the twenty dollar range and had things on them that I would never use. Years ago a light up hub might have appealed to me but now, its just a waste. I needed something basic and dependable and that is exactly what I got with the Ultra. It came with a one year warranty but as I have said in the past, chances are if something is going to fail it is going to do it within the first month of use if it isn't dead out of the box to start with.

The Ultra 2.0 USB Hub required no software installation. Windows Vista [which I loathe] recognized it and set everything up for me. I was pretty excited about it and plugged everything into it from the get go. The broadband card went into the left side port and the hub adapter went into the back port. Right away I went to power up my webcam to see if it worked any better with the adapter and all I got was a black screen. It showed that it was working but there was no image. I unpluged the cam, swapped the broadband adapter to the USB hub and plugged the cam into the left side port. It worked. No one can tell me why this happened.

Price wasn't a huge concern for me. I wanted something that would work, without fail, every time I powered up my laptop. So far the only issue I have had is not being able to run the webcam through it. The broadband cart is big so it takes up two spots on it; the laptop only has two USB ports and I have to keep one of them open in case I want to plus in the cam. Right now having only three usable ports on the hub expander isn't a big deal but I may have to bump up to a a six port in the near future. I paid about nine dollars for this from Tiger Direct. NewEgg would have gotten my business but they said my PayPal account wasn't validated.

The only bad thing about the Ultra USB Hub is that the cord on it is pretty short. For me it isn't a big deal because I have it on the back port of the laptop. I can see the light bar on the broadband card so I know if my service dips and I can plug / unplug things in seconds. In hindsight I should have gotten a flat strip adapter hub instead of one that has two and two side by side. That could have solved the problem I have with the fat broadband card.

For the price I am pretty happy with the Ultra USB Hub Adapter. There are times when it stops interacting with the laptop. I hear a little ding and the Logitech Optical Mouse stops working and about two minutes later I get a notification that I am not connected to the internet. I can count the number of times that has happened on one hand so it isn't something that worries me. When it does happen I just shut off the broadband connection, unplug the adapter, wait one minute, plug it back in and everything starts working again.

If you need a USB adapter and don't want to spend a lot of money on it then this is something that you need to check out. Even if it dies after the one year warranty is up, I will have gotten my moneys worth from it tenfold.


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^V^ © 2009 Freak369 ^V^
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