PC frustration

[Nightbird]

Just a typical story with new hardware...

3 weeks ago I had some issues with my PC when I switched on 2 USB hard drives at once (as I did many times before). Then all USB devices started turning on & off in an endless loop, including mouse and keyboard. Because I had frequently problems with the USB 3.0 ports I connected everything to USB 2.0 and it worked, but external hard disks disappeared from time to time which caused some data loss. Because the PC is 7 or 8 years old I decided to get something new instead of searching and trying to solve the problem.

So I spent 1500 Euros for a new computer, new USB cables and USB 2 and 3 hub, new keyboard and mouse.
Installed Windows 10 and run into the first problem: The cheap key from ebay didn't work. But I had a old laptop from e-waste that had a win7 pro sticker on it, so I used that key to activate my windows 10 installation.

Installing mainboard drivers from DVD? The new computer doesn't have a DVD drive, and the old one stopped working a year ago.
So I had to go to a friend and copy the DVD on my USB stick to install the software.

Installing graphics card? No CD/DVD included but a download link. On the website I found 6 (or 8?) different models of my card.
Ok, just picked the one without any additional names in it. Works fine!

First start, checked settings, installed other programs, copied data... But the picture didn't fit on my screen.
Old computer was connected via VGA and 1080 pixels worked fine, new computer is connected via HDMI and the picture was bigger than the screen.
Both settings on the computer and on my 40'' TV was 1080p, I tried with different settings (overscan, resizing) but got no satisying result.
Google helped my out by letting me know that I have to change my TV's picture settings from 16:9 to auto. Ok, works now.

Installed external hard drives, connected USB 2 drives to a USB 2 hub and did the same with USB 3.0.
USB 2 worked, but USB 3 said 'device not recognized'.
Tried a bit with changing cables and ports, then I found that the new hub was crap. So I connected the most important drive via extension cord to the computer which resulted in an endless loop of 'USB device disconnected' sounds.
USB extension? Crap, although I didn't get the cheapest one but some middle price class (deleyCON).


Sent back the hub and the extension today and ordered new items.
This time I'll try the USB 3.0 extension cords from 'amazon basics' and a USB 3.0 hub from Anker.
I hope it works better...

And I thought when I get everything new it would be better and easier

When I got everything running I'm sure that rendering new pictures will make a lot more fun than before

[Presston]

Yikes. Sounds like you've had a pretty rough time of it so far. I've found that extension cables and hubs have caused me more problems than anything else though. PM me if you need some help. I might be able to remote in and have a look.

[Nightbird]

At the moment with USB 3 drives connected directly to the computer or via the USB 2 hub it works.
I now wait for the new cord and hub to test it again.

I never had so many problems with a new computer, but it seems like it was just bad luck with the USB 3 stuff.
Very unusual that both, new cord and hub are faulty.

[DonKichote]

I can only agree: external drives and extension cords doesn't work as it should (quite often). I think that motherboard don't give enough of power, or drop of voltage is too big for such external device.

[Hoofprint]

Have you maybe tried a powered USB hub?

I was having similar problems, but then bought a powered USB-3 hub. This hub powers all devices connected to it on its own, not relying upon power from the PC. The hub has its own power cord that plugs into the wall, of course, but otherwise, it works just like any other hub.

From the moment I started using it, all of my USB-cycling issues just simply went away.

[Nightbird]

The motherboard is a gaming board which actually should have enough power to run a 4 port hub.
My 3 external USB 3 hard drives have their own power supplies so I thought that even a non-powered hub should be ok.

On USB 2 I can run 4 hard drives on a hub at the same time without problems, as it should be.

I know that USB is quite sensitive to low quality cables and bad connections so I'll try it with other cables and another hub as soon as I get them.

[Hoofprint]

The motherboard is a gaming board which actually should have enough power to run a 4 port hub.
My 3 external USB 3 hard drives have their own power supplies so I thought that even a non-powered hub should be ok.

On USB 2 I can run 4 hard drives on a hub at the same time without problems, as it should be.

I know that USB is quite sensitive to low quality cables and bad connections so I'll try it with other cables and another hub as soon as I get them.

I had the exact same problem. Powered HDD losing 'Connection' with the PC. Once I got the self-powered hub, that and a few other problems went away.

Up to you, but I seriously think a self-powered USB hub just might solve your problems.

[Nightbird]

I definitely will go for a powered hub if the one that is on it's way to me doesn't work as it should do.
Besides that, the new computer is working well. Much faster but a bit louder than the old system.
I'm re-installing my render content to a new drive now and can't wait to try a test render

[Nightbird]

Nothing new at this time.
I got the new hub and cable, but I'll try them later when the scan of my crashed render drive is completed.
Scanning for 162 hours now, 26 hours remaining - I hope that I can get the data back.
This was my only hard drive that I didn't copy for a backup yet because it lost connection frequently while copying on the old PC.

The files are still there, but I hope they are not damaged when I copy them to another drive after the scan.

[Nightbird]

I installed the new extension cords and the hub (not powered) now and everything works fine.
But the data rescue was unsiccessful. Not a single file was working after I copied them to another disk, so I had to accept that all my render data is gone. Just formatted the disk and scanned for errors, disk health is 100% so I just have to start over again.

This means no new renders for the next time, and most of the old images are lost too.

I wanted to re-arrange my content folder in the next time, but not THIS way

[Presston]

Sorry to hear that you lost everything. It's going to take a long time to rebuild everything. I hope you're able to get models and such so you can get back to making fun renders.

[Nightbird]

I think it will take some time to rebuild the content folders, but on the other side I can get rid of all the old stuff that I installed and never used. When I started rendering I downloaded everything that I found which messed up the folders. At least 40% of all the files was old and incompatible with the current models.
And I bought two 10 TB hard drives now to have an extra storage for backups...

[Zebra heavy]

Sorry to hear that you lost everything. It's going to take a long time to rebuild everything. I hope you're able to get models and such so you can get back to making fun renders.

This is why we have back ups

[Nightbird]

This is why we have back ups

I was not able to do back ups at this time because the drives always disconnected while copying.
The hdd that failed went into sleep mode when disconnected and started spinning again when it reconnected so this may be the reason why it got damaged.
My new system works fine with powered USB hubs and all cables as short as possible and I have backups of everything.

[Zebra heavy]

Sometimes you are just unlucky