# A 40 foot USB run, Cat 6 and Euroblock to USB adapters?



## gafftaper (Jul 11, 2019)

I'm doing a lot of upgrade work on my sound system this summer including taking the time to run stuff through conduit that was running along the floor between the mixer and the rack. I have a computer for audio playback with an M-Track 8 in my audio rack, connected by a 25' USB cable. The current cable works great, but it runs along the floor. I would love to run this cable through conduit instead. However that conduit run goes up to the ceiling and back down, adding around 20 feet to the length of the cable run over just going along the floor. 

I was at my local electronic shop and saw these cool USB A plugs with a Phoenix/Euroblock connector on the back (Like this). So I decided to try them out. I ran Cat 6 through the wall and wired them up. When I plug it in to the M-Track, the computer can see that there's a USB device there but can't load the drivers. It's just an unknown USB device.

Is my cable run just too long without some sort of active extender?

Am I perhaps wiring them up wrong? There was no packaging and no indication on the Phoenix/EuroBlock Connector of how to wire them. I assumed it was best to just use the same pattern on both ends. I also tried reversing the pattern on one end to see if that would fix it. No luck.

I suppose I could have damaged one of the cables in the Cat6 while running it, so I will try running a meter on the connectors to make sure that's not a problem. 

Ideas?

I'm leaning towards it just being too long. If you have a suggestion for a good extender product let me know. As I said I've got Cat6 in the wall so in 10 minutes I can throw RJ45 plugs on the cable and be ready to go for an extender.


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## NOM115 (Jul 11, 2019)

I would say that your cable is too long. You could try a USB extender. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01FHTCH68/?tag=controlbooth-20


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## JimmyM (Jul 12, 2019)

I would think something like this would be perfect: https://www.monoprice.com/product?p_id=6149

Interestingly they have options for up to 83 feet which is pretty impressive.


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## gafftaper (Jul 12, 2019)

JimmyM said:


> I would think something like this would be perfect: https://www.monoprice.com/product?p_id=6149
> 
> Interestingly they have options for up to 83 feet which is pretty impressive.



That's what really has me really confused here. I found a 50 foot cable on Amazon. How can a plain cable that long work and not my Cat6 when Cat6 is higher quality faster cable?


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## NOM115 (Jul 12, 2019)

Max length for USB 2.0 is 5 meters (16' 5") before starts to degrade. USB 3.0 is even less. So you would need an extender or repeater to get the length you want. The cable that JimmyM posted has a repeater on one end which is probably why that cable will work. Extenders tend to use cat 5 or 6 cable.


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## gafftaper (Jul 12, 2019)

I did a bunch more reading and settled on this extender. I'll report back how it works out.


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## WooferHound (Jul 13, 2019)

Using a Cat 5/6 cable, you would want to make sure that the USB Data Lines are on one Twisted Pair and the Power Wires are on a different Twisted Pair.
The unusually long cables you can buy should have an Active Extender molded into the Source USB Plug.


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## Malabaristo (Jul 15, 2019)

If that one doesn't work, then this one likely will: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B008ABNZOE/?tag=controlbooth-20

I'm currently using one for a 100+ foot connection from a Mac Mini to a Biamp Tesira DSP using their virtual soundcard interface. When looking into that, I came across some info from Biamp that indicated a majority of USB extenders do not play nicely with the isochronous communications commonly used for USB audio.
https://support.biamp.com/Tesira/Control/TesiraFORTE_USB_interface


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## eadler (Jul 17, 2019)

WooferHound said:


> Using a Cat 5/6 cable, you would want to make sure that the USB Data Lines are on one Twisted Pair and the Power Wires are on a different Twisted Pair.
> The unusually long cables you can buy should have an Active Extender molded into the Source USB Plug.


This (or, alternatively, they don't have any active extender and they're really just for power). Also, they may have larger gage cable. You can try pairing up multiple pairs on the power lines if the power may be an issue.


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