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I'm suffering from USB creep and need the maximum number of hubs possible. Should I get a USB 3.0 rated hub even if my devices are not USB 3.0? In other words, does the added speed of 3.0 allow the aggregation of non v3 devices to work better?

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    If you have no USB 3.0 devices and/or no USB 3.0 port then getting a USB 3.0 Hub is sort of pointless.
    – Ramhound
    Mar 29, 2013 at 17:42
  • Unless you're doing a lot of file transfers simultaneously between the computer and multiple 2.0 devices, then a 2.0 would be fine. The other thing to consider is, do you intend to ever get 3.0 devices (my guess would be yes), so is the future-proofing worth the money.
    – nerdwaller
    Mar 29, 2013 at 17:52

2 Answers 2

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The usb 3.0 hub would not allow your 1.x or 2.0 devices to perform any faster, but it still may be a good investment if you plan to add usb 3.0 devices in the future.

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In one word: yes.

Hubs of any kind (USB, Ethernet) are "intersections" for the connections they bring together. Your hub is the bottleneck of the "network" of USB devices. If you have five USB devices linked to your hub, they + your computer will fight for the bandwidth of ONE USB3 connection. Now, of course some devices don't require too much bandwidth like the mouse and keyboard, but some (USB HDD at copy) do.

You better have more bandwidth than less, so go with the fastest USB hub you can find.

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