System Freezes while connecting drives to Front USB

Hi,

I have a really weird problem which I have spent a week trying to fix and hoping someone will help me here. First my config

P4 3GHzHT Processor 630
MSI 915G Neo2 Platinum Motherboard
2x1GB Dual Channel Kingston DDR2 533MHz RAM
Seagate 160GB SATA HDD
Sony DRU 810A DVD-RW
Sony FDD
Antec Super Lanboy Case
Antec Truepower 2 480W Power Supply
LG1980U 19" LCD
MSI Geforce 6600GT 128MB PCI Express

Whenever I connect any portable hard drive or flash drive (including my ipod shuffle) to either the front USB or the rear USB thats connected to the extra motherboard headers, the system freezes instantly. My gamepad and digital camera works fine while connecting to the same USB connectors so theres nothing wrong with the connections. The drives work fine while connecting to the USB ports on the motherboard itself.

I have mailed the MSI support and they have asked me to recheck the pin connectors about three times, which is correct (the MSI supplied connector can only connect one way, so there is no possibility of a mistake here)

Has anyone seen this before? I saw a similar problem on another forum and tried their options but none work (as it didnt for the person who posted it!) - link below

http://www.thecomputermechanics.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-1067.html

Besides this, while first installing the chipset drivers (Intel INF), I got a message that said a USB device had exceeded the limits of the hub port (though there was no USB devices connected at the time). Can this have something to do with it?

I'm really getting desperate as this is all I've been trying to do for over a week :-(

Please help,

Sid

 

hi m8 ,do you have any exclaimation marks in device manager,also have you tried checking the event log for a warning,control panel,administrative services,event viewer,P.S what os is this on,could be the windows mass storage device files are corrupt,is the problem specific to this msi board as you have been trawling the forums

 

Rikky,

Thanks for the superfast reply - I tried a few more things

To test further by elimination, I removed the rear usb headers and tried only the front - still no success. Next, I disconnected the front USB connectors of the case and surprise - the rear one works fine now, which leads me to believe there is a problem with the front usb connectors. Since the connector is a box type, I cannot try other combinations as well and it only fits one way. Can you let me know if the supplied front USB connector is compatible with the motherboard I have? If not, is there any way I can get an adapter or detach the wires so it can be connected properly? Please help as I definitely need a front usb.

The motherboard pin connectors are as follows

1 VCC
2 VCC
3 USB0-
4 USB1-
5 USB0+
6 USB1+
7 GND
8 GND
9 Key (no pin)
10 USBOC

While the Antec Case specifies the following

Pin 1: USB Power - may also be labeled +5V
Pin 2: Negative Signal - may also be labeled P-, D-, USB0- etc
Pin 3: Positive Signal - may also be labeled P+, D+, USB0+ etc
Pin 4: Ground
Pin 5: Ground

Which doesnt match up and they dont even list the remaining pins. But the front USB connector of the case comes in the standard intel format which only lines up one way, so I cant even test it out.

Any help is appreciated

Cheers

Sid

 

They do match up ,theres no way for them not to usb 1-2 cables are identical,only the speed is different,as you look at your motherboard pins they are different to as you have listed,they match up like this

1 VCC
2 VCC Pin 1: USB Power - may also be labeled +5V
3 USB0-
4 USB1- Pin 2: Negative Signal - may also be labeled P-, D-, USB0- etc
5 USB0+
6 USB1+ Pin 3: Positive Signal - may also be labeled P+, D+, USB0+ etc
7 GND
8 GND Pin 4: Ground
9 Key (no pin)
10 USBOC "I'd like to know what this pin is for,first time I'v seen it"

The only thing I can think of is the cables leading from your motherboard to your front usb ports are drawing too much current when your harddrive is connected,it might be a good idea to remove the cables and ports from your case and check to make sure there isnt a short somewhere along the line.

Just to reiterate,you have tested the front usb ports in the the socket that the rear usb ports connect to on the motherboard and it locks up and vice versa when you test the rear usb ports in the front sockets on the motherboard they also work, pointing directly to a problem with the connection between the motherboard and the ports on the front of your case?

 

Rikky,

No I have not tried switching them around - I will do that when I get back and post back the results.

Meanwhile a quick search on google lists the pin 10 connector (USBOC) as USB OverCurrent - could this have something to do with it as the d-bracket connector for the rear usb has no wire leading to this pin while the front usb connector does.

Sid

 

The rear connector works fine when plugged into either header so no problem with the mobo. Should I try cutting away the wire (two wires actually - one for each port) going into the USBOC pin? Since it is a standard box connector i cant just disconnect that one wire and the only choice I have is to cut it or pull it out.

 

Hmm?The over current protection is there for a reason,it maybe giving you a clue that the HD is drawing too much current so it locks up to protect your board,therefore the over current must connect to the harddrive,rather than cut it do you have a usb extension or hub you can try that doesnt have over current protection,installing this between the HD and mobo will break the circuit but keep your wires intact

 

I'm not sure if this will help, but I had a similar problem. Anytime I plugged anything in the front usb, my pc would freeze, couldn't figure it out. A few weeks latter the bios chip got messed-up, reflashing didn't fix the problem, the mobo wouldn't display anything without distortion, like particles all over the screen, luckily I have a gigabyte with dual bios, switched over to the other bios, all problems went away.Never had another issue again.

 

Guys,

Success at last! Apparently disconnecting the pin 10 did the trick. I wrote to both the MSI and Antec support a while back but got replies that didnt help - after pointing out my observations to both, they both agreeed that the pin 10 connector was the cause of the problem. Apparently, Antec uses the 10th pin for a ground, while MSI uses it for a USBOC. So antec very helpfully sent me a link (http://www.antec-inc.com/specs/ezusb.html) that showed how to disconnect the pin from the box connector without cutting it (very helpful as I would have hated to cut it just to test) and alls well!

Thanks for the help!

Cheers

Sid