Vista 64 Bit, USB Cable longer than 15 feet

[xxceler8]

I am trying to get a USB Extension, but the cables say not compatable with windows vista. I don't understand this, how could a OS not like a longer USB cable.

Anyone care to shed some light on this one?

 

[ViRGE]

It's probably bollocks, they didn't want to go through the trouble to get Vista logo'd.

 

[rudder]

How would vista know whether a conductive piece of metal is vista certified or not?

 

[bsobel]

I believe some USB extensions (the long ones) may show as a hub device, you would need vista drivers for that hub to see it and the downstream devices. Now if this is a dumb or devices cable, it shouldnt matter

 

[ViRGE]

Even if it were a hub device, it should still be a standard hub, there would be no need for special drivers.

 

[phisrow]

It could also be that the cable in question isn't fully compliant with the USB spec, which might keep it from being certified(I'm not quite sure how picky MS is about that sort of thing). There are a bunch of fairly common, and useful, USB cables (male typeA-male typeA, Y cables, overlong cables, etc.) that don't actually conform with the USB spec. Cables longer than 15 feet would fall into this category, if I remember correctly.

 

[Aluvus]

Originally posted by: phisrow
It could also be that the cable in question isn't fully compliant with the USB spec, which might keep it from being certified(I'm not quite sure how picky MS is about that sort of thing). There are a bunch of fairly common, and useful, USB cables (male typeA-male typeA, Y cables, overlong cables, etc.) that don't actually conform with the USB spec. Cables longer than 15 feet would fall into this category, if I remember correctly.

USB's official limit is 5 m, which is about 16 ft, of continuous cable (without a hub or repeater). So if you wanted to be picky, then even combining a 15 ft extender with a > 1 ft cable would be breaking the spec. In practice, most devices are pretty forgiving.

I would imagine that these cable manufacturers just didn't want to pony up for the Vista logo program. It is possible that the answer is more complicated (Vista's USB drivers are pickier about timings or something), but I would be surprised.