Use two USB ports in order to get 4 with power? Meh.

It's got electrolytes! It's what plants crave!

Radio Shmack has carried this under their "Gigaware" line for a while now.
(For ten bucks more of course)
[www.radioshack.com]

I can only judge it by the fact that I don't get returns on them.

Peripherals for the impatient?

...anyone who manages public areas to access information (libraries/labs/cafes) will definitely love this.
The small plastic (rectangle) hubs get damaged very easily... this "squid" design will last longer.

@hakubak: Hey, for people who have small form PCs (like I used to), it just might be what the doctor ordered.

@DaOtter: ...it just might be what the doctor ordered???

Really?

That's a weird doctor.

The value of 3 USB Ports is slightly greater than the drain you've caused to the computer... a net gain for our fair city!

1. Open PC case.
2. Throw in twelve bucks.
3. Close PC case.

It's got red and black male USB connectors; I guess that's the positive and negative. Whoa. Better be careful about hooking the red and black up correctly kids...

So what happens if you don't have two side by side (or over and under) USB ports on your laptop (or desktop)
I have a Dell xps m1330 with only 2 USB ports - on opposit sides of the laptop. Then again, I doubt I'll ever need more than 2 at the same time. Just a question for thought I guess.

- corpor@te -

Eh, you gain one USB port and one miniUSB. I'd consider it if it was a 4 port with the miniUSB and no brick.

@scarbrtj:
Oh my good ghod that was fantastic!

@scarbrtj: Truly awesome.
I also like his inescapable logic at the beginning:

"You can find other jumper cables for a lower price, but not these. So for the extra $10 or $12 why not buy these while they're here?"

Wait, that's exactly how Best Buy sells Monster cables now that I think about it.

Have one from Tandy. It ain't dandy.

Works OK for small devices, much like a USB extension cord. But doesn't work as well for larger devices, those that really want a powered hub.

Go with a powered hub.

My older Toshiba Portege came with one of these, although it was much more compact, and included a pass-through for the second USB connector so you'd still have a free port.

The thing worked great, and I keep it around for all my power-hungry USB stuff.

@92BuickLeSabre: @strider_mt2k:
You'll probably enjoy this if you enjoyed that:
[www.cracked.com]

This would be appealing if it gave me a gain of more than 1 extra USB plug.

@BasicBlack:

1) Doesn't work with laptops and PCMCIA cards are bulky.

2) Either requires the use of USB headers on the motherboard, or using up the very limited PCI bus...133 MB/sec (theoretical) shared among all PCI devices leaves little bandwidth for these USB slots since USB 2.0 can do 60MB/sec theoretical (40MB actual). One flash drive and one external drive can effectively max out the entire PCI bus and make other things on it appear sluggish.

3) Requires you to know how to (and have the slots to) install a card into your computer and install/configure drivers. That's a lot more work than the typical user wants to do when a $12 hub can just be plugged in instead.

...so you waste 2 ports to get just one more and a mini USB? Oh hum.

@joestoner: Brawndo ftw. Good play sir, good play.

Brando, the interoperability mutilator!

old got one of these free with a dell laptop in 99

@scarbrtj: Freaking hilarious.

$12 for 1 USB port, are you kidding me?

USB hubs using up 2 USB ports to draw power has been around for a long time already. At least other ones give you 4 or more ports.

I need one of those right now. Pity I'm nowhere near a store that would sell it.