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I was setting up an order on Amazon to purchase all the necessary (and some unnecessary) components for room scale VR, and I ran into a problem: The Oculus cameras are not wireless. So I threw a pile of inactive and active USB 3.0 extension cables into my cart, making up for the ~100 ft of cable I need to run all around my room (in total, the longest distance is about 30ft if I recall correctly).

I ran into one problem though: My plan was to use a longer active cable, followed by a shorter inactive cable(like this one) (like one of the cables included with the Rift). I would run these cables in series, with the active cable plugged directly into my PCI-E USB 3.0 hub. Will this work, or should I just get all active cables?

EDIT 1: I have done away with the cheap Amazon inactive cables, however the link still leads to them. The inactive cable I am talking about is the one found on the Oculus Rift's sensor cameras. I have also started using this active USB 3 cable as well as one (as opposed to the three I was planning to use prior to this edit) CableCreation cables.

2 Answers2

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The short answer, from what I have found, is yes. A huge thanks to Christopher Hostage for linking me to a place with the answer.

Yourcablestore.com's "USB Cable Length Limitations And How To Break Them" page says the following:

You can use a regular USB cable in conjunction with an active cable as long as the regular cable is ... not more than 3 meters (9 feet and 10 inches) long for 3.0 devices.

and

[The maximum length of USB 3.0 cable] depends if you are using a regular cable with an active cable or not. If you are not using a regular cable, then ... the maximum recommended length for USB 3.0/3.1 is 18 meters (about 59 feet). If you are using a regular cable ... with an active cable, then ... the maximum recommended length for USB 3.0/3.1 is 15 meters (about 49 feet).

Therefore, you can use an unpowered USB 3.0 cable in tandem with a powered one, however, it will lower the recommended length. USB 2.0 follows a similar pattern, outlined in the parts I omitted from the quote.

EDIT 1: I found in a video review on various USB 3 extension cables that the CableCreation cable (among other 5m USB 3.0 active extension cables) is "one that you'd plug into anything, and it works" (whitedragon101).

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Random combinations of active/passive parts from Amazon likely won't work. There are technical difficulties when transmitting USB 3 signals over that long distances. Two solutions exist so far:

  1. Active cables with re-timers every 4 meters, see products from Newnex. Maximum cable without a hub in between is 16 meters, with three re-drivers in between; This is mostly very new developments.

  2. More established fiber-optical converters (USB-fiber-USB), made by Corning Optical Cables. These can run for 30 meter distance.

I haven't tried any active extender cables myself yet. None of these cables, AFAIK, have USB-IF certification logo, but I personally would trust more the Corning solution.

But if your active extender ends with active Type-A receptacle,

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it is very likely that the USB 3 signal would be fully restored at this end, and extra passive cable of your device will likely work.

Ale..chenski
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