All USB Devices Stop Working In A Specific Case

[Meehael]

Hi everyone,

a strange thing happened to me again yesterday. I plugged in four xbox 360 wired controllers and every USB device stopped working! The xbox controllers were just constantly blinking. My illuminated keyboard started blinking, too.
Keyboard, mouse and all xbox controllers became unresponsive.
PC worked normally otherwise. Music kept on playing, monitor was on, and all applications and processes were running.
I tried unplugging all of the controllers, the keyboard and mouse, and then plugging in the keyboard and mouse only, but it didn't help. The keyboard was blinking again (instead of constantly emitting light). I also tried using different USB ports, but it didn't help. When that happens, I must do a hard reset/shutdown

What's interesting, it only happens occasionally. I always use the same USB ports for the devices. I only rotate them between the xbox controllers. The keyboard and mouse always use the same ports. The last time it happened, I noticed as if Windows didn't recognize a controller and wanted to install drivers. That's when all stopped working.

Any ideas? Could it be that I plugged the xbox controllers too fast, as in plugging them all in only 3-4 seconds? That's the only reason why I think it could happen.

I have up-to-date Win7 Pro 64-bit
Steelseries Sensei RAW laser mouse
Zalman K400G illuminated keyboard
4x Xbox 360 wired controllers
I don't have any PCI or PCIe devices on my mobo, just the graphics card. I have one optical drive and two extra chassis fans, two SATA HDD drives and one SATA SSD drive.

Other specs are in my signature.


Thanks!

 

[Burpo]

It is likely your many USB devices together required more power than your power supply could deliver (5 volt rail).
I recommend getting a powered USB hub for your controllers.

 

[Meehael]

Can't reproduce the issue at the moment. I've tried twice by plugging in all four controllers as fast as I could.
The issue seems to occur randomly. It happened two or three times so far in the last twenty 4-player gaming sessions over the last six months, so it's pretty rare, I guess.

 

[CorsairDemon]

Do you think it's possible that you're causing an amp surge on the usb ports?

Even though the devices may not be using the total amps available through the usb, having all the ports used for such devices could randomly cause voltage drops or amp issues.

When the devices go all funky, does windows device manager notice they are plugged in but with error (usually, unknown usb device). Just a few thoughts.

 

[Meehael]

I hear you, but I can't go to the device manager to check that. My input gets disabled when that occurs.

 

[CorsairDemon]

There's a few troubleshooting steps you can take to kind of run down the issues.

I had an instance once where a bad USB keyboard would constantly short out my ports and do something similar.

1. Try one device at a time, such as: Plug a device in and out repeatedly to see if you can reproduce with just once device plugged in (The device you're plugging in and out).

2. Chipset drivers/BIOS updates/Reset BIOS to defaults are all good things to try unless you're not familiar with them. Do be wary, do not try to flash a bios with usb especially since you've had USB issues.


3. Ubuntu Live Disk. To rule out any possibility of windows being a little bitch. Repeat step 1 with Ubuntu, and then your tests that you did by plugging the xbox controllers in fast.

4. Check all your usb ports. Make sure they don't have any junk/gunk/metal in them. I've seen some small debris really junk up machines before.


Other than these things, I can't really think of anything else to help with this, but keep trying. Intermittent issues suck.

 

[Meehael]

There's a few troubleshooting steps you can take to kind of run down the issues.

I had an instance once where a bad USB keyboard would constantly short out my ports and do something similar.

1. Try one device at a time, such as: Plug a device in and out repeatedly to see if you can reproduce with just once device plugged in (The device you're plugging in and out).

2. Chipset drivers/BIOS updates/Reset BIOS to defaults are all good things to try unless you're not familiar with them. Do be wary, do not try to flash a bios with usb especially since you've had USB issues.


3. Ubuntu Live Disk. To rule out any possibility of windows being a little bitch. Repeat step 1 with Ubuntu, and then your tests that you did by plugging the xbox controllers in fast.

4. Check all your usb ports. Make sure they don't have any junk/gunk/metal in them. I've seen some small debris really junk up machines before.


Other than these things, I can't really think of anything else to help with this, but keep trying. Intermittent issues suck.

Thanks for the tips, will check them out.

Regards!