41 replies to this topic

[SoldMyWiiUAndLeftTheForums]

Yeah they do as long as they are low powersed HDD.

[CoffeeBuzz]

you are making the Wii U constantly push extra juice to that external HDD

That is 100% wrong. It cannot bully the WiiU USB port to give it more power, please read my last post over again.

[cannonshane]

^^^ Just relax and forget about it mate, He know's better OK........................

[Plutonas]

No its not the safe side... If the usb HDD runs in low voltage and its slow.. then maybe you wont have any problem. But in most cases, you will... The hdd will try to drain more power to work and it will stop working due to limited usb power. Then the hdd will reset and restart and anything you did before, will be lost.

Its something I posted several times here and in nintendo uk forums, but I got attacked by nintendo blinded fans.. lol Since, I didnt bothered, but here it is!! Nintendo also claims that "for safety reasons"...

They could avoid that, by adding a high voltage usb port.. those usb ports we use for recharging and transfer data as well, they can give extra power for this hdds and they cost nothing!! I wonder why they didnt do that... Or they could add a docking station, attached on wii U, with e-sata port connector.

Nintendo clearly followed the cheapest solutions in many things. I ve read that even hdmi is locked (?).

ps: if you search almost 1 year ago messages in here.. you will find one post of mine, talking about it... And I know this problem from the PC... it was a huge problem before they release the high voltage usb ports... Usb hdd's crashed all the time because of it. Thats how I knew that this is a small conflict with wii U. They dont crash in a small file transfer (saves or small reads, downloads).. but they do crash in a huge file transfer.. eg. Game installment, a game that runs entirely from the usb hdd and the hdd works very intensively....

So I would suggest you to avoid usb hdds that drain power from the same usb port...

Edited by Orion, 07 December 2012 - 12:02 AM.

[flyingcircus]

No its not the safe side... If the usb HDD runs in low voltage and its slow.. then maybe you wont have any problem. But in most cases, you will... The hdd will try to drain more power to work and it will stop working due to limited usb power. Then the hdd will reset and restart and anything you did before, will be lost.

oh come on seriously? the amount of half knowledge hidden in this sentence is baffling
i actually felt coerced to sign up just because of that

2.5" hard drives are designed to work with less power than they might need, this is the only reason why they can be powered with usb only at all and it is also a requirement to work without interruptions in a notebook that runs on battery power
if the drive absolutely needs more power than usb 2.0 can deliver it will ship with a y-cable so you can connect it to both usb ports (usually the case with 7200 rpm drives.. 5400 rpm drives will usually work with a single usb connector however i've been using my wii with a 2.5" 7200rpm internal HDD in external casing, meaning it was not specifically meant as an external HDD, for years without ever running into trouble)

if they draw more than usb 2.0 can give but still receive enough to continue operation the result is that they will slow down, which will of course affect file transfer speeds and reaction time however NO files will be lost even if the hard drive should "restart" (which it won't)
your files are absolutely safe when plugging in a 2.5" drive on a single connector as is your console
usb will never deliver more power than it is specified for (standard is 2.5watts)
if the usb port can't deliver the necessary power it will simply not start up

if the engineers at nintendo are worth their salt they'll also have designed the PSU of the wii-u so that it will be able to power all usb ports, render a demanding game and power any additional peripherals at the same time without running outside specifications

They could avoid that, by adding a high voltage usb port.. those usb ports we use for recharging and transfer data as well, they can give extra power for this hdds and they cost nothing!! I wonder why they didnt do that... Or they could add a docking station, attached on wii U, with e-sata port connector.

there is NO such thing as a high voltage usb port
every port MUST run at 5V it's in the specification.. if an unaware user was to plug his usb device into a usb port that delivers more than 5V he'd have to buy a new device
you're probably referring to usb 3.0 since it delivers a higher current than usb 2.0.. voltage is the same

ps: if you search almost 1 year ago messages in here.. you will find one post of mine, talking about it... And I know this problem from the PC... it was a huge problem before they release the high voltage usb ports... Usb hdd's crashed all the time because of it. Thats how I knew that this is a small conflict with wii U. They dont crash in a small file transfer (saves or small reads, downloads).. but they do crash in a huge file transfer.. eg. Game installment, a game that runs entirely from the usb hdd and the hdd works very intensively....

i've never heard of these stories you're talking about.. if a 2.5" drive is specified as an external usb 2.0 drive it will definitely run on any standard usb 2.0 port, also i have been running plenty of games off several different external 2.5" usb HDD with no problems whatsoever

This can lead to burning out the PSU, and lead to overheating. This is no different than a PC trying to run a video card that requires a larger PSU. It will still power the card, but in time, it could cause damage.

actually any decent PSU will rather either shut down completely or choke the power delivered to the PC (potentially causing it to crash which will however not hurt the hardware of the PC) before the PSU itself is damaged
anywho
there is a fixed number of connectors on the wii-u.. if the PSU isn't capable of powering all of them at the same time then something went horribly wrong during the design of the console
besides the 2.5 watts are delivered directly to the device on the usb port.. there will be no additional heat generated inside the console.. the only additional heat would be generated in the PSU itself which is not inside the console and should, as already mentioned, be capable of dealing with the load

I am not saying this WILL happen. But telling someone they have nothing to worry about, is simply giving false information.

no the information that has been given is completely correct
it is save

There is always a possibility of running in to risks when you use an external hard drive running off of the consoles PSU. Most consoles have amperage designed for that console to run properly. Taking away from that could lead to issues.

i see so the external HDD drawing the same power from 2 usb connectors is alright (as confirmed by nintendo) but when drawing from one usb connector it magically damages the console (and no the usb connector cannot deliver more power than it's specified for in case you'd like to bring that up)
you should probably reflect on that some more because it makes no sense at all

Edited by flyingcircus, 07 December 2012 - 08:24 PM.

[cannonshane]

Finally someone who actually knows what he is talking about.

[Lethal]

You guys knock yourselves out running your external HDD off the Wii U's power source. Don't cry here if your console decides it does not want to turn on for you.....

[flyingcircus]

You guys knock yourselves out running your external HDD off the Wii U's power source. Don't cry here if your console decides it does not want to turn on for you.....

jesus stop the fearmongering already
i've been using the wii with a 2.5" hard drive for years
our consoles will be just fine
besides a 3.5" hard drive, in spite of having its own power source, will still draw power from the usb port.. did you ever bother to look at the AC adapter of your 3.5" HDD? it says 12V
however if you do a little bit of research you will realize that 3.5" HDDs require both 12V (spin up, maintain rotation and if i am not mistaken the read/write heads) and 5V (controller and other electronics) .. now take a wild guess where those 5V are coming from

better don't connect that external HDD of yours or it will destroy your console

Edited by flyingcircus, 07 December 2012 - 09:41 PM.

[Plutonas]

oh come on seriously? the amount of half knowledge hidden in this sentence is baffling
i actually felt coerced to sign up just because of that

2.5" hard drives are designed to work with less power than they might need, this is the only reason why they can be powered with usb only at all and it is also a requirement to work without interruptions in a notebook that runs on battery power
if the drive absolutely needs more power than usb 2.0 can deliver it will ship with a y-cable so you can connect it to both usb ports (usually the case with 7200 rpm drives.. 5400 rpm drives will usually work with a single usb connector however i've been using my wii with a 2.5" 7200rpm internal HDD in external casing, meaning it was not specifically meant as an external HDD, for years without ever running into trouble)

if they draw more than usb 2.0 can give but still receive enough to continue operation the result is that they will slow down, which will of course affect file transfer speeds and reaction time however NO files will be lost even if the hard drive should "restart" (which it won't)
your files are absolutely safe when plugging in a 2.5" drive on a single connector as is your console
usb will never deliver more power than it is specified for (standard is 2.5watts)
if the usb port can't deliver the necessary power it will simply not start up

if the engineers at nintendo are worth their salt they'll also have designed the PSU of the wii-u so that it will be able to power all usb ports, render a demanding game and power any additional peripherals at the same time without running outside specifications



there is NO such thing as a high voltage usb port
every port MUST run at 5V it's in the specification.. if an unaware user was to plug his usb device into a usb port that delivers more than 5V he'd have to buy a new device
you're probably referring to usb 3.0 since it delivers a higher current than usb 2.0.. voltage is the same



i've never heard of these stories you're talking about.. if a 2.5" drive is specified as an external usb 2.0 drive it will definitely run on any standard usb 2.0 port, also i have been running plenty of games off several different external 2.5" usb HDD with no problems whatsoever



actually any decent PSU will rather either shut down completely or choke the power delivered to the PC (potentially causing it to crash which will however not hurt the hardware of the PC) before the PSU itself is damaged
anywho
there is a fixed number of connectors on the wii-u.. if the PSU isn't capable of powering all of them at the same time then something went horribly wrong during the design of the console
besides the 2.5 watts are delivered directly to the device on the usb port.. there will be no additional heat generated inside the console.. the only additional heat would be generated in the PSU itself which is not inside the console and should, as already mentioned, be capable of dealing with the load


no the information that has been given is completely correct
it is save


i see so the external HDD drawing the same power from 2 usb connectors is alright (as confirmed by nintendo) but when drawing from one usb connector it magically damages the console (and no the usb connector cannot deliver more power than it's specified for in case you'd like to bring that up)
you should probably reflect on that some more because it makes no sense at all

I am not keen of queting messages, to make them look impressive... but read a small article about usb2.0 power http://www.extremete...your-smartphone

Newer pcs, have special usb ports for external hdds... And for what you write, saws me your experience is EXTREMLY poor, not to say un-excistant... I also had a 2.5 hdd in my laptop and when my laptop died, I decided to make it an external hdd and BOOM i had the same conflicts (years ago). My pc now is new tech, but I stopped using externals, years ago, due to this problems. But if your hdd cage comes with an external power cable, their will be no issue at all.

Also search on google about any kind of devices that charge or power up, via a usb port and how many conflicts and problems have been reported all these years.. even with iphones and ipads.

There is low voltage hdds, if you search by "how much power they consume" to fit ur crappy usb2.0 port, but these hdds are garbage, trash... poing... plastic craps... I never buy cheap products in good looking packaging, just to charge me for the colors and the images in the box, instead of the good quality product.

And my suggestion always is and will be, buy an internal hdd with an external cage and in depended power cable. This will give you zero problems, higher built quality, last much longer and bigger warranty.

Edited by Orion, 08 December 2012 - 04:13 AM.

[Gamejunkie]

You guys knock yourselves out running your external HDD off the Wii U's power source. Don't cry here if your console decides it does not want to turn on for you.....

Absolute rubbish. Connecting and running an external hard drive with the Wii U isn't going to have any affect on its lifespan.

[flyingcircus]

I am not keen of queting messages, to make them look impressive... but read a small article about usb2.0 power http://www.extremete...your-smartphone

Newer pcs, have special usb ports for external hdds... And for what you write, saws me your experience is EXTREMLY poor, not to say un-excistant... I also had a 2.5 hdd in my laptop and when my laptop died, I decided to make it an external hdd and BOOM i had the same conflicts (years ago). My pc now is new tech, but I stopped using externals, years ago, due to this problems. But if your hdd cage comes with an external power cable, their will be no issue at all.

Also search on google about any kind of devices that charge or power up, via a usb port and how many conflicts and problems have been reported all these years.. even with iphones and ipads.

there is no such thing as a special USB port for HDDs and there are NO low voltage USB ports, do some research into the specifications!
the maximum a USB 2.0 port can deliver is 2.5 watts and it always does so at 5V
that has always been so and will never change
yes on older PCs there are sometimes ports that have less lanes and thus deliver a lower amperage, these were only meant for connecting keyboads/mice and other low power peripherals however as the article states these are becoming increasingly rare and if you ran into them you simply connected the device to a different port
and the wii-u doesn't feature any of these or else 2.5" drives would not work at all, the article also states that any external drive that requires more power will be delivered with a y-cable.. but you seem to have missed that in my post because that is exactly what i wrote
talking about being unable to read thoroughly: i explicitly stated that 7200rpm 2.5" HDDs that aren't specifically meant to be run as an external hard drive can have issues if you run them off a single USB port.. but i never recommended using those, read my post again
any external 2.5" drive that's delivered without a y-cable will be just fine running off a single usb port
also you're using an internal (most likely 7200rpm) drive that's not meant to run as an external drive and are surprised that it doesn't work? are you that daft? they can work but no one ever said that they will work

There is low voltage hdds, if you search by "how much power they consume" to fit ur crappy usb2.0 port, but these hdds are garbage, trash... poing... plastic craps... I never buy cheap products in good looking packaging, just to charge me for the colors and the images in the box, instead of the good quality product.

no there are no low voltage 2.5" HDDs goddammt learn the difference between current and voltage.. you can't even differentiate between the 2 and call my experience "un-excistant" it's a disgrace

your line about them being rubbish is utterly ridiculous.. there is nothing cheap about them, warranty is also the same.. what a stupid statement
furthermore the speed of a 2.5" HDD is completely sufficient for the wii-u since any 3.5" HDD will be severely limited by the throughput of usb 2.0 anyway (30MB/s max for read and write operations, a 2.5" 5400rpm HDD will already reach these speeds.. easily) the advantage of using a 3.5" over a 2.5" HDD on a usb 2.0 port is de facto zero unless you need the higher maximum capacity.. which you do not on the wii-u.. you get more noise, more cable tangle and a higher overall power consumption with the bigger drive
but considering you don't seem to have a clue about what you're saying i didn't expect you to know that

Edited by flyingcircus, 08 December 2012 - 08:27 AM.

[Plutonas]

there is no such thing as a special USB port for HDDs and there are NO low voltage USB ports, do some research into the specifications!
the maximum a USB 2.0 port can deliver is 2.5 watts and it always does so at 5V
that has always been so and will never change
yes on older PCs there are sometimes ports that have less lanes and thus deliver a lower amperage, these were only meant for connecting keyboads/mice and other low power peripherals however as the article states these are becoming increasingly rare and if you ran into them you simply connected the device to a different port

interesting, yes or no? On older pcs? some?

USB ports experience the same thing again and again, at date... its about cheaper or quality solutions. This will never change... And yes, there is a special usb port that gives higher voltage for charging and stuff. hmmm... If I remember well, antec, coolermaster or corsair adds that by defult in the cases... I have to check, but I cant be bothered much at the same time... make ur research. Also newly motheboards, have that by default... not all ports though... http://www.extremete...your-smartphone

also these ports cost next to nothing... I wonder...

Edited by Orion, 08 December 2012 - 09:49 AM.

[flyingcircus]

interesting, yes or no? On older pcs? some?

the relevance to this topic being?

USB ports experience the same thing again and again, at date... its about cheaper or quality solutions. This will never change... And yes, there is a special usb port that gives higher voltage for charging and stuff.

i am telling you again: look up the USB 2.0 specifications, your ignorance is unbelievable
there are so called dedicated charging ports but they are nothing more than power sockets (and you will not find them on any mainboard), also they do not have a higher voltage but a higher maximum current, a higher voltage would destroy the device as i've been trying to explain to you repeatedly
these ports are however inable to transfer data signals due to the high current and are thus irrelevant to our discussion -> not a port, just a power socket
furthermore the information in that article is incorrect
a charging downstream port cannot supply up to 1.5A of current.. only the dedicated charging ports can do that, a charging downstream port which is also able to transfer data has a *maximum* amperage of 500mA and these are nowadays the standard ports on any mainboard, with the exception of some front panel jumpers, and it's also the kind of port that is built into the wii-u, considering 2.5" HDDs actually do work

and again: any external usb 2.0 2.5" drive will work on any CDUSB 2.0 port get that into your thick head

Edited by flyingcircus, 08 December 2012 - 10:26 AM.

[Plutonas]

Question : what is difference between high-power usb and other usb port.

Answer : You may connect high power devices to self powered hubs only and low power devices to either bus or self powered hubs.
High power devices are devices that draw more than 100mA from the USB power line, low power devices are ones that draw 100mA or less. High power devices are typically bus-powered cameras, bus powered hubs. Low-power devices are typically mice, keyboards, joysticks, and any devices that come with their own power supply (also known as self powered devices). Most general purpose hubs come with their own power supply as well and therefore are self powered. A subset of hubs called bus powered hubs gets power from the bus and therefore has the limitation of only supporting low power devices.

leave me alone! hahaha

USB 2.0




The Hi-Speed USB Logo

• USB 2.0: Released in April 2000. Added higher maximum signaling rate of 480 Mbit/s (effective throughput up to 35 MB/s or 280 MBit/s) (now called "Hi-Speed"). Further modifications to the USB specification have been done via Engineering Change Notices (ECN). The most important of these ECNs are included into the USB 2.0 specification package available from USB.org:^[13]
  
  • Mini-A and Mini-B Connector ECN: Released in October 2000.
    Specifications for Mini-A and B plug and receptacle. Also receptacle that accepts both plugs for On-The-Go. These should not be confused with Micro-B plug and receptacle.
  • Errata as of December 2000: Released in December 2000.
  • Pull-up/Pull-down Resistors ECN: Released in May 2002.
  • Errata as of May 2002: Released in May 2002.
  • Interface Associations ECN: Released in May 2003.
    New standard descriptor was added that allows multiple interfaces to be associated with a single device function.
  • Rounded Chamfer ECN: Released in October 2003.
    A recommended, compatible change to Mini-B plugs that results in longer lasting connectors.
  • Unicode ECN: Released in February 2005.
    This ECN specifies that strings are encoded using UTF-16LE. USB 2.0 did specify that Unicode is to be used but it did not specify the encoding.
  • Inter-Chip USB Supplement: Released in March 2006.
  • On-The-Go Supplement 1.3: Released in December 2006.
    USB On-The-Go makes it possible for two USB devices to communicate with each other without requiring a separate USB host. In practice, one of the USB devices acts as a host for the other device.
  • Battery Charging Specification 1.1: Released in March 2007 (Updated 15 Apr 2009).
    Adds support for dedicated chargers (power supplies with USB connectors), host chargers (USB hosts that can act as chargers) and the No Dead Battery provision which allows devices to temporarily draw 100 mA current after they have been attached. If a USB device is connected to dedicated charger, maximum current drawn by the device may be as high as 1.8 A. (Note that this document is not distributed with USB 2.0 specification package only USB 3.0 and USB On-The-Go.)
  • Micro-USB Cables and Connectors Specification 1.01: Released in April 2007.
  • Link Power Management Addendum ECN: Released in July 2007.
    This adds a new power state between enabled and suspended states. Device in this state is not required to reduce its power consumption. However, switching between enabled and sleep states is much faster than switching between enabled and suspended states, which allows devices to sleep while idle.
  • Battery Charging Specification 1.2:^[14] Released in December 2010.
    Several changes and increasing limits including allowing 1.5A on charging ports for unconfigured devices, allowing High Speed communication while having a current up to 1.5A and allowing a maximum current of 5A.
• Powered USB
  This section does not cite any references or sources. (May 2012)
  Powered USB uses standard USB signaling with the addition of extra power lines. It uses four additional pins to supply up to 6 A at either 5 V, 12 V, or 24 V (depending on keying) to peripheral devices. The wires and contacts on the USB portion have been upgraded to support higher current on the 5 V line, as well. This is commonly used in retail systems and provides enough power to operate stationary barcode scanners, printers, PIN pads, signature capture devices, etc. This modification of the USB interface is proprietary and was developed by IBM, NCR, and FCI/Berg. It is essentially two connectors stacked such that the bottom connector accepts a standard USB plug and the top connector takes a power connector.^[

<sup>And a tip... If a usb port gives more power than its needed for a usb device... the device wont blow up... if you dont believe me, I can copy paste again... a whole book for you to read.

A power hub could do the job, its a small plastic like "card reader" shaped box, with 5-6 usb2 ports on it, it comes with independed power suply and it can provide enough power to these usb ports... But thats a ridicules buy for the wii U.</sup>

Edited by Orion, 08 December 2012 - 10:50 AM.

[flyingcircus]

granted i was unaware of the availability of 1.5A currents while still allowing a data stream, that specification is fairly new, before revision 1.2 it used to be 500mA for a CDP and 1.5A for a DCP.. considering the specification is this new you will not find many devices featuring a CDP that can take a current of 1.5A
that however does not change the fact that any external 2.5" HDD you can currently buy that only comes with 1 connector is able to run with an amperage of 500mA which is what this discussion is really about
neither does it change the fact that all usb 2.0 ports run within the same voltage parameters

Edited by flyingcircus, 08 December 2012 - 11:57 AM.

[Keith]

By the way. Just so you guys know, my wii u has seemed to recieve damage from what i believe was the usb hdd(the toshiba that nintendo recommended). My WiiU was acting weird.Choppy graphics and such. Then i read about Y cables and then suspected the hdd being the issue, then low and behold, i unplug the hdd, and things look better, with the exeption of a new ``ghosting``effect.I wasnt useing a y cable, over a long period of time, and now my wii u displays``ghosting``.  It ghosts with out the usb hdd pluged in.Feels like the hdd damaged it. i hope this is informative. and thank you for shedding more light on this issue. Also, there is a dark flickering that occurs on white screens, that which seems to be on rythm with the sound of the active machine(fan)

Edited by Keith, 04 April 2014 - 04:58 PM.

[grahamf]

My hard drive didn't work until I used a y-cable. I haven't tried any others, but I'm sure it's dependent on the drive. I'm using an old 2.5" 250gb external I bought years ago.

[Kokirii]

Here's my understanding:

 

All drives with their own a/c adapter work

 

All portable drives work if fitted with a Y-cable to use two USB ports

 

Some portable drives will work even without the Y-cable, on just one USB port

Edited by kokirii, 05 April 2014 - 06:13 AM.

[Alex Atkin UK]

What you also have to watch out for are USB 3.0 drives as they will only have a single USB connector due to USB 3.0 being able to output enough current, but when plugged in to USB 2.0 will not have enough current to work reliably.

 

Like said above though, a USB 2.0 drive designed to work on a single port should be fine, although I have never seen such a device.  Personally, I wouldn't risk using a USB 2.0 HDD without a Y cable no matter what as you can never be sure any USB host puts out exactly 500mA.  Its not unusual for them to be slightly under-spec and a Y cable ensures you do not have any problems.

 

Also, caddies that you put your own drive in sometimes only come with a single cable even though almost all 2.5" drives need a Y cable to work properly.  You most certainly CAN damage the drive by running it on less current than it needs as it will randomly fail to write data correctly and become corrupt, potentially even damage the platters as it may spin up/down at random preventing the auto head parking from working correctly.

 

However, if your Wii U is having problems with a USB 2.0 HDD plugged in, either the Wii U or the drive is faulty.  The Wii U should cut power to a USB port if a defective device is plugged in, I would be very surprised if they did not have sensible safety precautions on the motherboard to deal with that.

Edited by Alex Atkin UK, 07 April 2014 - 01:49 PM.

[EskobarM92]

I will be running a WD passport (3.0/2.0) on my new Wii U. Bought a Y cable just in case.

Edited by RetroGames87, 21 April 2014 - 02:21 AM.