Old PC Upgrade #3: USB 3.0 Ports
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 16 มิ.ย. 2024
- Upgrading a desktop PC by adding USB 3.0 ports. This is the third episode in the series which began in this video: • Old PC Upgrade #1: Opt...
The fourth episode in this series, in which I fit a new motherboard and CPU in the PC, is here: • Old PC Upgrade: Mother...
The PCIe USB 3.0 card I fit is this one from Amazon.co.uk: www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B074TGDN4... (affiliate link). However, I would shop around to find the cheapest card with the number of USB 3.0 ports you require, as well as a power connector and an internal USB 3.0 header if you want to connect up USB ports on your case. Paying more for a USB 3.1 or 3.2 card is a waste of money when upgrading an old PC, for the reasons demonstrated in the performance tests in the video.
The USB 3.0 front panel I fit is this one: www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00Y164SY... (affiliate link). There is a very similar product, also including front audio jacks, on Amazon.com here: amzn.to/3pz5iD3 (affiliate link).
You can download the CrystalDiskMark drive benchmarking utility from: crystalmark.info/en/software/...
If you enjoy this episode of ExplainingComputers, you may also be interested in my related videos:
Explaining PCIe slots:
• Explaining PCIe Slots
SanDisk Extreme PRO SSD:
• SanDisk Extreme PRO Po...
The PC build video in which I used a 5.25 to 3.5 inch bay adapter is here: • i7 PC Build: Part Two
More videos on computing and related topics can be found at:
/ explainingcomputers
You may also like my ExplainingTheFuture channel at: / explainingthefuture
Chapters
00:00 Introduction
00:44 The USB 3.0 Advantage
03:16 Card & Bay
06:59 Installation
11:55 Bay Watch
13:57 Performance
18:42 What Next? - วิทยาศาสตร์และเทคโนโลยี
Interestingly, I did exactly this about ten years ago when USB 3.0 was the coolest new thing. It was in fact one of the first upgrades I ever did to a computer. I was a middle schooler back then.
Ten years later I have built dozens of computers, fixed dozens more, and even got myself a compsci degree. Watching this gives me nostalgia for some reason, which I know is a weird thing to feel about watching someone upgrade their computer...
Crazy because I’m looking into getting a compsci degree as well and it feels like I’m experiencing exactly what you have.
This is actual helpful stuff. You are showing useful information for a normal budget user instead of showing 64 core CPU benchmark score ;)
you would be amazed at how much power is packed on the P5K pro motherboard used with famous core2quad processors, just add up a pcie card for usb 3.1 and m.2 and over 15 yrs later it is a very solid build
_I really liked the part where you explained how the older PCIe spec and chipsets curtail the speed of the USB 3.0 card!_
timestamps??
"Bay Watch" ROTFL. Informative and entertaining as ever, Mr. Barnatt.
The show where "if it's jiggling, we need to tighten that part down". :D
:)
Always love a bit of 'Stanley, the knife, action, lol.
Another immensely useful and informative episode. Thank you, Chris!
First thing I always do after watching a video from the EC upgrade series is take the panel off my PC and see what PCI slots I have available.
Thank you Chris, informative as always, and thank you for including the Amazon links in the description.
These are so much easier to watch than those videos with cuts and hops and sound effects every five seconds.
Wow, there’s a lot of technical factors to take into consideration on a fairly simple project like this. Looking forward to your next video!
Love your channel. Very well-planned and produced videos. The range of topics and the video lengths are appreciated. You hit the sweet spot in your level of technical explanation.
Thanks for your kind feedback, appreciated. :)
As you can see on the pcie card, the manufacturers provide a gap to get your cables under the card for a better cable management. I discovered that not so long ago and can be really useful in hard cable management situations :)
You can see the gap pretty well at 9:15
I didn't even notice that. Thanks for the tip!
I thought of that too. I still wonder if the cable length would be a bother in that situation.
@@NicolasChapadosGirard it depends on what cable you're trying to get through, in my case it works well to get my fan cables all the way to the plugs at the bottom of the motherboad!
i always used that gap for hd audio headers and the cpu power cable
@@virtualtools_3021 I guess it depends on where the CPU power connector is placed on the motherboard but often it's at the top. Wouldn't running it behind the motherboard be a more elegant solution? Although you may have to root it before installing the motherboard.
When removing front bay blanking plates, it is a much safer idea to reach in whith a screw driver and tapping the handle to eject the plate. The metal tabs in those bays are very well suited to cutting through skin. 3 stiches was enough to teach me that lession, hopefully this comment can help others avoid such accidents.
I'm pretty sure some of 'em are in cahoots with razor blade manufacturers...
Great series. Really looking forward to motherboard replacement episode. That’s one upgrade I have never tried and I am eager to hear Chris’s advice.
Howdy from across the pond in Houston, Texas! I had been unsure if it was possible to install a 3.0 port on my old computer motherboard and also have ports on the front of my case. Your video answered every one of my questions flawlessly. The views you showed in your video were excellent and the description was "spot on". I really liked the honesty when you showed that you had to figure out how to reroute the cables. That has happened to me so many times. Throughout the years I have used TH-cam videos hundreds of times to do all sorts of repairs around my home and yours was one of the very best I have ever seen. Thank you very much for making this video. I wish you and your family a blessed life.
Thanks for this. Good luck with your PC upgrade.
I've had a quick look through the comments and I don't think anyone has mentioned one point about this upgrade, When I added a USB3 card, similar to the one you used, to a 10 year-old Mesh computer, I noticed that the USB3 card was not recognised by the BIOS. The USB3 drivers were supplied by the operating system, Windows or Linux. If you regularly try out Linux distros by booting from USB drives you still need to use the USB2 ports. The same would apply to a Windows Recovery USB drive. You can use USB3 for creating the USB boot drive as you already have an Operating System running. Otherwise it's a very worthwhile addition and, as usual, your explanations were very clear.
Just came upon your channel. Excellent! The way you explain things can be easily understood by anyone. Very good! 10/10.
Thanks and welcome.
Like usual, I always find something useful to learn from your insights. Thank you for being clear and thorough in explaining the details of your given topic of the week.
Another well produced and presented tutorial.
Love these, thanks EC.
I like your videos because they are real-world situations I've often had to deal with in friends and family computers. A lot of tech videos are only dealing with brand new hardware, perfect cable management, in cases that cost more than the entire computers some people have. I'm hardly ever dealing with brand new bleeding edge stuff- it's so often things like this- adding USB 3 to an old computer and dealing with 'how to get power to a new component" from some old PSU with all those red, black and yellow wires- NOT some nice modular 1000W PSU that's a week old! Anyway, thanks for a fun video on a real world upgrade!
Thanks for this post, it is great to get this kind of feedback. My experience is also that most people do not have the latest expensive hardware.
That's a spiffy update for an old piece of kit. Loved the "Real World" performance figures!
I think one of the things I appreciate the most about your videos is when you point out the limitations/pitfalls of undertaking something like this. For someone who does this professionally or as a hobbyist it might seem like a no-brainer, but for someone coming into this green that can be invaluable pointing out bottlenecks (such as the PCIe x1 1.0 on this rig) so they're not tempted to install the latest and greatest parts in a decade old machine. Thank you for the video!
Love my Sunday learning course. Always a pleasure Christopher. Thank you for your videos.
I have also become a big fan of the hook and loop fasteners for cable management as well. If you swap things out with any frequency at all the re-use ability is so nice.
Excellent episode. I’m continuing to upgrade my old Linux PC right along with you. Thanks
A simple upgrade but explained with excellent detail. Thanks for another great video.
Best assembly close-ups I have ever seen, especially the screw retaining the PCI-E card!
A pleasure to watch, for the quality of the filming alone.
Thanks. :)
Loved your Victorian "modesty" swimwear in the Bay Watch section - lol. Again clear and honest instructions and appraisal - thank you.
By episode six Chris will be saying, “Right, as you can see we’ve upgraded this 10 year old PC into an IBM Mira.”
Baah! I have a Radeon 9250 PCI in my first build a Socket 7 ;-P
@@jba2048 Yup! Socket 7! Look it up! 1.mover :-P
Yeah, well, OKAY! It is not my primary - in 2021. Happy?
Edit: all above x86 desktops < me.
nice meme
@@jba2048 Why the "< me" ..dunno should i've said Deep Blue to be cool?
@@jba2048 ..or maybe I'm to AMD CPU blind? (AMD ♥'er since the 486 DX2 66MHz!!) ...let's just HATE each other - INTEL™FAN-boi!
This UPGRADE is awesome. I liked it a lot. Congratulations! I'm going to do it on an old PC I have at home to see the result. Excellent job tips.
Good clear explanations, reasonable measured pace, crystal-clear camera work, accurate and detailed.
Loved the "Stanley of a knife " cameo😀
Even though it was a short cameo, he doesn't slack on his cutting edge method acting.
Nar it’s all about mr scissors ✂️ for me he’s a cut above the rest
... if I could just cut in for a second ...
Don’t forget Mr Scissors!!
I think Mr. Screwdriver as supporting lead adds a twist to the plot.
Glad I came across this, have been planning on doing this for awhile , good pointer on the molex power connector, wouldn't have thought of that.
I agree. Very crucial detail.
As a complete IT novice, it took me several weeks to find the courage to attempt to install the SSD I had already bought. I looked at many TH-cam videos but it was this one by Chris which finally enabled me to install the SSD. Everything is calmly explained with just a touch of humour and the various components and connections are shown so very clearly. I shall consider upgrading my usb slots next,
Many thanks indeed Chris. I shall recommend you to the Which magazine computer staff.
I did a very similar video 3 years ago with a very similar PCI-E card, only difference is my hard had 5 USB 3.0 ports.
These PCI-E cards are brilliant and after 3 years I can report it still works.
Great series BTW, enjoying these videos
I love the Old PC upgrade series. So helpful for those on a budget.
I love seeing it too even tho I've done such upgrades a hundred times. There's always one more little thing to learn in the process. Also, I hate seeing perfectly good hardware junked when it can be helped along a bit and still be useful.
Chris, you are my favourite with a wicked dry sense of humour. I absolutely love this channel!
Nice vid. Well explained. I'm watching this series as recently had some issues with my pc, and I'm learning more about what happens "under the hood"
Thanks Peter. :)
I like your videos because they are real-world situations I've often had to deal with in friends and family computers.
Just finished ripping down the kitchen
And now I shall chill back, watch and enjoy👍
Great Video: When you said about when to stop spending money on upgrading, it reminded me a bit of the episode that featured Triggers Broom in "Only Fools & Horses" :-)
I really like this, very well explained and documented. Remember me of the time I had a desktop PC case like this, upgraded many times in the same case back in the 90s. I was very surprised to notice this is still possible to do (case standards are still the same) and that is great news in a time of glued together hardware. Did I lived under a stone for decades? No, however I use laptops all the time and never looked back. Very refreshing video, hopefully many desktop users will follow your examples to keep what they have to extend the life of a product. Kudos!
I love watching explaining computers so much I mean it's fun and easygoing to watch
Finally, been waiting for this, I may use this for my old pc
A nice cup of tea on a lovely sunday afternoon is best paired with a new ExplainingComputers video from Chris :-)
Greetings!
Was also drinking tea while enjoying the video :) Just seems to go together, eh?
THIS is the upgrade my 10 y.o. i5 1st gen PC needs. I'm so glad you cladrified certain things like the on card power supply and the hardware limitations, but we need a video explaining the renameing of the USB protocol and how some companies may take advantage of this at the expense of their customers, by misleading them.
Thanks for all your effort. Stay safe
Ok, another great video & another step in the pc upgrade journey. So glad I didn’t throw my old tower pc away now! Thanks again Chris.
This video series gives me hope in old pcs :)
Hopefully parts will be more affordable sometime in the future, and mobos not be as forgotten in spec lists >.>
"Intense plug-in insertion action"
Darnit Mr. Barnatt xD
we all have a twisted mind don't we ? ^^
You are so convincing I am tempted to upgrade my current computers, which are relatively new but can always use more USB ports. Thanks for the inspiration.
Thank you for such clear and precise explanation. Such wonderful videos really helps us understanding a relatively new hardware and how easily and fast we install and start using it. Thanks once again. Stay healthy, cheers.
Perfect technical practical that everybody can understand with smooth comments. Thx.🙏🇮🇳🙏
10:53 Chris said damn 😂
A very good and useful explanation of the caveats of fitting USB3.0 into old motherboards. Thanks!
"Rejoice in the excitement"... You're killin me. Smile. Very informational and entertaining as usual. Thanks.
These series are great, I love restoring old hardware and give them a new life!
Thank you for the video
I was also planning to add a new USB 3
Good job
Very nice, Chris, I've been thinking of doing the same with my old PC. It is still my daily driver, and it serves me pretty well. BTW, I love the way things are clearly explained, as if you were a true teacher (maybe you are?). Thanks for the knowledge shared!
I remember watching a video years ago now, where you first purchased the front USB 3.0 bay. It was just after I built my first PC, so as soon as I finished watching the video I bought the exact same USB 3.0 front header, been using it everyday for years now and they really are a fantastic piece of kit!
Just ordered the two usb components off Amazon from your Link. Good informative video.
Great to hear -- good luck with your upgrade.
Didn't expect to see Bay Watch in this video. 👀
Unfortunately, this new hardware doesn't make it flop around when it's running.
😂
@@lastinline1958 The movie was entirely shot in slow motion.
My first time on this channel by way of this video and I absolutely love the way you explain things.
Awesome, thank you!
Im no computer guy and all the tutorials i watched never helpped. This video was amazing and explained everything very well. Thank you so much.
One of the best channels overall in TH-cam
"Sometimes can be an absolute swine." Brilliant!!!!!
I just want to say, this channel is part of the only three channels where I keep "all notifications" active. Really good quality content here!!
Wow, thanks!
Very much looking forward to the next episode, hopefully to include the thought processes leading up to upgrade of the mobo and CPU. How to choose and whether to do it at all. Can't wait.
That's the plan!
I like how you throw in pieces about the various standards. I tend to forget about the importance of chipsets because it's not an everyday thought for us non builders. Spending that extra $ on a better motherboard at purchase can get you a few more years in this data hungry world, it's not all about what processor you get stuffed in there that makes it a relevant machine years down the road.
I recently got hold of 4 Tyan m/b's dated back to 2008, with onboard Intel graphics, 2 pcie slots, 8 USB 2, 6 sata and with 2.6 gb dual core Pentium cpu's...I'm running SpaceEngine on one of those with a GTX 1050ti and 4gb ram. (not to mention the Kingston SSD) Needless to say, USB3 will be my next upgrade here, so thanks a lot for this timely bit on the subject Chris. 👍
Okay, now I'm jealous. Back in the day Tyan was my fave board. I still have several from the 440BX era. Super-stable and reliable.
@@Reziac It's amazing how far you can stretch old tech with a little upgrade here and there. I'm running 2020 software (games etc) on a 12 yr old board. (edit)Oh yes, it's a very stable board..👍
Splendid stuff - love watching your videos - really good
I did a similar upgrade on my computer about four years ago with 5 USB3.0 ports on the back and an AFT Pro-77U with 4 USB3.0, a CF card slot, a MS Card slot and a Micro SD slot. What a HUGE improvement in performance and versatility.
I had a stroke reading the USB names. They seriously need a re-rename.
It did go semi-ok until 3 ;-D
Next series: re-use old hardware (IDE hard disks and parallel printers) by downgrading modern pc's with PCIe cards.
Thank you for the great videos. I've been following along upgrading a Dell Inspiron 530.
Certainly i didn't think of connectivity, usb 3.0 addition is absolute must i would say, great video 😁
It’s weird to think of a USB port being bottlenecked by PCIe of all things.
Even more fun when you realize many oems put in a pci-e 4x slot that was only wired for 1 or 2x!
thank you for the good advice and sound realworld comparison.
esp SATA II and SATA III, with PCIe x1 to x16 with their gen evolution. so this was very uselful. Thankyou.
Brilliantly presented and explained. Could probably win UK's got talent!!!!!!
I can do with upgrading my laptop with a new battery, just recently I upgrade the memory to 12 gigabytes. Well worth the speed increase
I was thinking the same. And to replace the hard drive with an SSD.
I'm currently in the process of converting an old laptop into a portable Linux machine. Im currently upgrading ram to 16gb of ddr3 1666mHz, storage to a 250gb ssd, and making a bootable drive. Battery may see an upgrade, but the system already gets a good 6 hours away from the wall.
john lennon tech tips
Exactly！！
It's a pleasure to watch this series!
Great video Chris! I've done RAM and SSD upgrades to old PCs but not USB 3. I look forward to the motherboard and processor upgrades.
An interesting comparison when you upgrade the board and processor would be power consumption of both old and new systems
I had the same thought! of course it would depend a lot on the choice of board and CPU. I have a couple different i7 that have almost the same performance and similar specs -- idling, the Dell uses about 40W and the Asus-based system uses about 140W.
And after all these upgrades, don't we end up with the equivalent of Trigger's well maintained broom (Only Fools and Horses), where the broom is 20 years old with 17 new heads and 14 new handles! :)
Was thinking thes same, lol. I wonder if a new case and PSU comes after the motherboard and processor video. ;)
@@watsoft70 And just think. When you've finished the upgrade, you can build a new PC from all the old parts you now have, that looks remarkably similar to your old PC.
@@chrisg6597 I bet you'd soon be thinking about upgrading that one...you've done it before after all, lol.
@@watsoft70 ... well, actually, he’s gonna upgrade the CPU only, no motherboard swap mentioned.
Which is something I do quite often with Intel Core 2 Duo setups. The older E8500/E8600 used to be stupid-cheap.
Around Turkey-Day 2019 I got four E8600 off eBay for $10 shipped. Total. All four.
I haven’t bought any since PanDemic days, but prices on most used PC stuff on eBay has grown rocket engines... to the moon.
Thanks for all the explanations! I have already upgraded the ram following your video.
Frellin awesome, all the upgrades that you have done & are going to do are the exact same upgrades that i need to be doing....super uncanny.
Thank you Christopher, i didn't think that the USB 3 port upgrade would be included in this as i desperately need to replace or upgrade the front USB's as little children accidentally knocked mine and they have never been the same since, glad that replacing them is as simple as putting lego together.
Looking forward to the cpu & motherboard upgrade as this is something I am also looking to bring into the 21st century, not that my pc is old but this is why i had mine built to a specification in order to be able to upgrade, again thanks for your methodical walk through
A new CPU and motherboard? This upgrade path is all too familiar.
Me: I might upgrade my RAM
Also me: £800 later...
Well this will be like at the end just a case from original pc
To be honest all of that single board computer videos was a bit overwhelming. I'm glad to see a balance between SBC and normal computer videos lately on this channel.
I'm glad you are happy, but nothing has changed with the balance -- I've been doing an SBC video just under every other week for five years! :)
Both are awesome !
Your explanations are always 100% clear and complete, near perfection. You would be a great teacher I think.
Quote: "And see, all is fine with the universe: Our USB 3 ports are faster than our USB 2 ports." :-)
Your video quality is so good. When the screw was on the screen I actually looked in the corner because I thought the video was in 4K.
Thanks. :)
Old PC upgrade...
USB-C: am I a joke?
USB-C, while convenient would be a joke to include on this. Beside, dongles can help to make these connections truly universal using USB type-A should you need it.
You can use a different frontpanel usb with c
Professor, I know you explained in the first video that a new graphics card and processor would imply a new Windows license. But I hope you can consider these upgrades just to see how much old hardware can still be renewed and rescued into a perfectly usable computing experience by today’s standards. We all should strive to get as much life as possible from our devices.
Actually, you can carry your windows licence through all a lot of upgrades, including motherboards, processors, graphic cars, etc. They just make it harder and harder for you. My last licence took half an hour on the phone with Microsoft employees to renew, but it was worth the effort. They gave me a whole new one, for free.
Windows is crazy. You'd think the product license should follow the CD. Meaning if you have 3 computers and bought windows 7 you own windows 7. Not 1 of your computers owns windows 7 until you upgrade it. Not that you couldnt just run a free linux build or run your wiindows without a loicense(it just annoys you about not having a loicense. Ive ran chopper windows builds without a loicense for years before without much issue) Anyway doesnt encourage anyone to really buy or use their product with that attitude. Some companies deserved to get chumped on. As in Someone is going to get ucked here so lets make sure its not me.
@@gantz4u never had original win and im happy with that. Im eastern european so i cant afford original one anyway.
@@mikes9753 Theyre $200 for a key here in the store. But somehow you can get a 10 yr old scrap top for that price with the latest windows installed with a key. Whoever is flipping those scrap tops I can gaurantee are not paying $200 for a key. I know someone who works for the government and he said "you paid for a key? I have 15 keys sitting right here. I would have given you one." the last time my hard drive died. I guess the state buys keys.
I think it was really helpful to talk about where the bottlenecks lie in this upgrade. Wasn't where I thought it was going to be and that's interesting.
Production remains as always, intentional, clear and concise. Really gives me ideas on what I would want my own videos (one day) to look like.
Thank you very much for your step-by-step explanation.
6:25 Chris is metal fan.
Ooh, the irony !
What a coincidence. That's exactly the two items that I bought last week.
Your channel will be a titan in educating generations for as long as humanity is still going!
Thanks! :)
I enjoyed the video more than I thought I would. Who knew a USB retrofit could be so interesting? Now, I'm keen to learn what motherboard and CPU Chris will recommend. Oh, the suspense...
_"... USB 3.0, as that name theoretically no longer exists."_ - 2:11
Well, *_theoretically_* someone's brain at the USB Implementers group no longer exists!
I'm still angry at the clever clogs who redefined 1GB to mean 1000MB, etc.
@@jeffreyjoshuarollin9554
Don't worry about it. 1 GB = 1024 MB in comp sci.
I'm old enough to remember when usb 2 seemed very fast compared to usb 1.
I'm old enough to remember when usb seemed a revolution ^^
I have usb1 on my Super Socket 7's and I am perfectly happy with the speed.
Thanks Chris very informative again. Looking forward to the next one👍
Thanks 👍
Excellent, been wondering about this possibility. Thank you, once again.
Huh. My computer at work, over the years I've also had it upgraded with more RAM, an SSD, and USB 3.0 ports. And it'll be 10 years old very soon (still has a sticker on it that says manufactured April 2011).
Still getting work done though, unlike so many of the Macs around the place that have had to be replaced. Hurray for non-upgradability! 🙄
Speaking of non-upgradability, I really hate how modern PC cases don't have 5.25" drive bays anymore, at least in the DIY market. Look case manufacturers, just because I don't use disc drives anymore doesn't mean I don't want 5.25" drive bays. I can stick other things in them, like the USB 3.0 front panel expansion as shown in this video, or small drawers to hold flash drives, or who know what else. A lot of options out there! Not when you have no bays, though. My case at home has built in USB 2.0 only, as well as Firewire and eSATA (it's a pretty old case). But it also has USB 3.0 type A and 3.1 type C thanks to 5.25" expansion bays. Also has side panel intake; forget about tempered glass, I want cooling for my graphics card!
Anyway I'm rambling a lot now. At least maybe the algorithm will like it...?