How long?

[munch]

Just wondering how long a USB cable can be and or how many many connections you can use?

It is just that I want to set my camera up closer to the bird feeders and take some tethered photos from the house.

(I know that our company doesn't run ethernet cables longer than 75m) I reckon I will need about 8m, I have already got about 3m connecting two together, just wondering if there would be any performance drop off if I used a 5m cable in addition or if I get someone to make me an 8m cable.

 

[neil_g]

Not longer than 5m. You can have powered USB hubs every 5m to extend that though.

Incidentally cat5 max run is 100m.

 

[munch]

Thanks for that Neil.

 

[RobertP]

I've successfully used a 3m USB cable on a 5m USB extension lead with a very basic webcam so it may be worth a try before you look for a way to do it properly

 

[neil_g]

I've successfully used a 3m USB cable on a 5m USB extension lead with a very basic webcam so it may be worth a try before you look for a way to do it properly

you will get voltage loss over 5m so signal drop/data loss. but i guess for a webcam thats not the end of the world..

 

[RobertP]

agreed

down to how much power is drawn and the size of the conductors in the cable.

 

[TopBanana]

I've got no specific information for USB cables and more or a general interest point, but adding in a cable connection will generally reduce the maximum distance you can distribute (e.g. an inline connection in a TV aerial cable will reduce the signal quality), so one long cable is better than two connected together.

It's not dangerous to try, so why not give it a go and see if any quality losses are acceptable.

 

[neil_g]

I've got no specific information for USB cables

http://www.usb.org/about/faq/ans5

 

[Tori_T]

You can get USB cables with built in repeaters up to 10m in length.