USB issue

Hi. 2 of my USB ports keep telling me there's a power surge whenever I try to hook anything up to them, even keyboard and mouse. What would cause this?? It's an older PC (2002), and it's a Gateway 500X. Thanks.:confused:
 

Rob Williams

Editor-in-Chief
Staff member
Moderator
Hmm, power surge? Could you maybe screenshot the error and post it here? I've never heard of such an error in Windows before.

If you did indeed have a power surge, chances are it screwed up your USB ports, which is unlikely to be fixable.
 

Kougar

Techgage Staff
Staff member
I've heard of this... it could mean you have to many USB devices drawing to much current through your USB bus, or if you have nothing else plugged into the USB ports then the USB ports themselves are going out.

Wouldn't hurt to try the mouse/keyboard in a different computer just to rule them out though.

Afraid I can't really help beyond that though:
http://www.google.com/search?client=opera&rls=en&q=usb+power+surge
 

Merlin

The Tech Wizard
Maybe try using a PCI card that has USB ports?
Or else it's the power supply for the whole computer.
As I remember Gateway never did power their machines correctly...such as Emachines, do now.

Merlin
 
The keyboard and mouse are fine. I will try to see if I just have those things hooked to the USB if it still power surges. I have had a lot of things hooked up USB.
 

Kougar

Techgage Staff
Staff member
The keyboard and mouse are fine. I will try to see if I just have those things hooked to the USB if it still power surges. I have had a lot of things hooked up USB.

As I said, it could also be you many to many things plugged in. Tried unplugging everything, then trying the mouse&keyboard?

The warning was implemented to help keep users from blowing out the USB fuses on the main board, once that goes the USB bus goes with it.
 
That's what I meant, just having the keyboard and mouse plugged in. I'll unplug everything and then plug the kb and mouse into the ports I'm having trouble with and see what happens.
 
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