USB 2.0 PC Card for HP ze5000 laptop (that works) 3

[yantisr]

I have an HP ze5000 Laptop (2.2GHz, 512MB RAM, 40GB hdd, 32MB Nvidia, 15-in UVGA, IEEE-1394, USB 1.1, IRD, 802.11b, 10/100 Enet) - but the one thing I am missing is USB 2.0.

I have tried a number of PC Cardbus cards: I/O Flex, Belkin, Adaptec, and Dynex. However, none work for various reasons:
1. I/O Flex - installs, HW Mgr "sees" it. But, it will not recognize & retain an external harddisk (Acom, Buslink) or CD-RW/DVD-RW (Sony) drive, even using the power supply for the card.
2. Belkin - didn't even try -- the cards are stuck to the packaging with a sticky goop adhesive that won't peel off without an extreme amount of damaging scrapping or solvent action. And I won't put it into my lptop's card slot with this stuff on it.
3. Adaptec - will support a USB mouse or digital camera, but not an external drive, even using the power supply for the card.
4. Dynex - just shuts down the laptop's power supply and battery, requiring removal of the battery, power-on with the laptop's AC adaptor only, power off, reinsertion of the battery, and power back on!

I suspect that the cardbus is inadequate to support the power demands of the external drives, even using the power supplies for the PC Cards.

However, this is a relatively new and powerful computer. So it seems that there should be a USB 2.0 adaptor for this laptop.

Does anyone know of a solution for this? I'd greatly appreciate any help.

Thanks.

Robert Y.

 

[johnlight]

yantsir
Well, as I might have suspected, the I/O Flex card does not appear to be working (fully).
However, question: Did you install the software included with the card?
Initially I did not, and when I plugged in my external hard drive I was pleased I did not receive the "high speed device plugged in to a low speed port" message as I had before and it seemed to work just fine. Had that been your experience with your devices? I was always able to get the hard drive to work at a lower speed before, I just clicked past the message. I see no difference in the speed, but didn't try a stopwatch.
Also: did you receive error messages from your 2.0 peripherals before? After loading the NEC USB 2.0 driver when I saw no change with my Minolta film scanner, it is still behaving as it always did and delivers "unable to connect to device, check cables". The scanner is also supposed to be downwardly compatible to USB 1.1 which I thought the laptop supported, but is it really only 1.0? Is this the bios change?
Since I just received my laptop back from hp I assumed any bios upgrade would have been included in their maintenance, but the support I have received has been so inferior (even when I am very nice). They just read me online pages from hp and Microsoft and have no real troubleshooting or practical experience to draw from (I know, because one operator told me so and gave me the URLs).
Anyway, I guess I am just ranting, no flame intended. Any more thoughts? I am about to search the hp site for bios upgrade to my machine. It wasn't even listed as a product until about 4 weeks ago, although I have had it now one year.
THANKS,
jl

 

[yantisr]

jl,

I just copied (via Windows XP Explorer) 518.0 MB (two files) to a BusLink 40 GB External harddrive attached to a USB 2.0 port on the I/O Flex card in 58 seconds. This roughly calculates to 535 MB per minute, which I believe actually exceeds the USB 2.0 spec of 480 MB/min. And the BusLink is not nearly as reliable as the Acom drives which I normally use.

I had already installed the I/O Flex XP drivers from the OEM CD that came with it, before I had found the solution of the “un-documented” BIOS update (from the helpful HP tech). So, maybe if you install the driver, it will clear up the problem.

The native USB ports on the ze5x laptops prior to the latest (e.g. ze5500 and the 17”-screen version) models is 1.1. The BIOS upgrade that I was steered to adds USB 2.0 capability to the PC Cardbus slots, but not to the built-in ports.

I don’t think you’ll have much luck finding the BIOS on the HP site on your own, as I did not. So it may pay to call HP support again and tell them that another user was given an ftp link to the correct BIOS – version KD.M1.81 - available in the SoftPac SP24353, release date 06-03-2003 ROMpaq BIOS update (see the link in my previous message). They should be able to give you the same.

Good luck.

 

[nightDenizen]

According to usb.org USB2.0 faq:

1: What maximum speed was finally chosen for the USB 2.0 spec?
A: The USB 2.0 specification has a design data rate of 480 mega bits per second.

http://www.usb.org/developers/usb20/faq20

That translates to 60MB/sec transfer rate, so it should take only 10 seconds to transfer a 600 meg file. The transfer listed above was at scant 72 megabits per second, or roughly 1/7th the advertised transfer rate, although still 6 times faster than usb1.1.

I recently flashed the bios of my HP ze4420us to fix my own cardbus problems. Transfer rates have increased to 43 megabits per second. Pretty pathetic really, but atleast the cardbus works consistently now. And its much better than transfering the file over the built in usb1.1, which transfers at a paltry 4.2 megabits per second, instead of the advertised 12. I get burst transfers at an accelerated rate, but quite frankly, usb sustained transfer rates are pathetic.

So in short, the bios updates have made things much better, but there is still quite a bit of room for improvement.

 

[yantisr]

nightDenizen,

You are right. Thanks for correcting my fuzzy memory and calculation, regarding the USB 2.0 spec. Any additonal information that you might find that may improve our zeXx Cardbus performance, would be appreciated also. I'll keep searching as well. I hope HP still may fix this issue.

And as bcastner said earlier, I still prefer IEEE-1394.

Thanks again.

 

[johnlight]

in over 24 years of personal computing and even some time in systems programming I have never encountered such a completely exasperating issue.
I spent the past two months first installing a new system at work where this particular USB 2 device: Minolta Dual Scan III didn't work on the USB 2 board there either and I chalked up all this failure to the hardware.
I returned the scanner on warranty to receive it back as "reconfigured to factory specs" and I still cannot get it to work on the USB PCMCIA I/O Flex card.
I am online with new "live" hp support who hasn't responded in over 30 minutes - I sent clips from our dialogue over past weeks. No response.
Thanks for listening!
jl

 

[yantisr]

Persevere, my friend, and thou may still find some success and satisfaction from HP. We can ever keep hope for their continued growth in awareness of their most important asset - their customers - without whose continued satisfaction and purchases, they would have no business.

If more seekers of solutions to these and other issues express their frustration with HP's technical and customer support, perhaps the dawn of enlightenment will arise in their midst, and we may all become joyous in their newfound awareness, sensitivity to customer care and commitment to resolution of customer problems and issues - a novel idea that is gaining momentum and growth in the industry every day now.

Thanks for the feedback.
rdy