2000mA to Venue 8 Pro USB devices using unpowered hub and OEM adapter?

Just a related question:

Using your USB OTG Y cable and the original DV8P power adapter and cable attached to the Y cable, are you able to attach to your DV8P and run a peripheral that needs power (such as a portable hard drive that needs power)?  I looked into purchasing a USB OTG Y cable at Amazon.com for this purpose but reviews I read at that website said that this arrangement was not working for the DV8P.

If it works for you, could you let me know what Y cable you are using and where you purchased it?  Thanks.   

Yes, I can  run USB devices off the OTG-Y cable. However, I know of no USB 2.0 devices that draw more than 500mA per plug -- which is logical. Moreover, I have ascertained that the juice is definitely coming from the V8P power adapter.

As for DVD drives and the like, they usually have two male USB plugs which draw 500mA each. I can not run such devices because there is a single USB jack on the OTG-Y cable and 500mA from one of two plugs is not enough and I get a USB fail sound. That is why I am looking for a 2000mA hub: It will let me plug in higher current devices.

I am confident that if there were such a thing as a 2000mA USB device with a single plug it would run OK on the OTG-Y cable. However, I do not think there can be such a device, given the specs of the USB standard.

Ken C

Thanks for the info. and the sources!  Will check them out. 

The reason I was asking is that my Western Digital Passport portable hard drive will not power up sufficiently to be run directly by the DV8P, even though it uses a single-end tail USB cable to connect to a computer.  My understanding, from user posts as well as from Dell itself, is that this is common--the DV8P just can't provide enough power for the portable hard drive (and one user wrote that this is the case for all portable hard drives). 

And so my thought was, use a USB OTG Y cable, with the single-sided end of the Y cable connected to the portable hard drive, and the additional end of the double-sided end of the Y going to the wall power to provide the portable hard drive with the necessary power.  But some posts I read at Amazon.com, addressing this same idea, said that it just wasn't working with the DV8P, unfortunately.  Shouldn't this work?    

Might I ask, what peripherals have you been able to run from your USB OTG Y cable setup?  I assume, from what you wrote, not a portable hard drive, as yours--distinct from my Passport--seems to potentially need more power than a single USB port can provide.   

I doubt the V8P can provide even the requisite 500mA from its USB port.

When connecting  an OTG-Y cable to the V8P, the cable male-A  goes into the V8P power adapter, The cable female-A connects to your USB device and the cable mico-USB-male plugs into the V8P.

The juice to power the USB device comes from the adapter, not the V8P.

Ken C

Did you actually check if the DV8P can provide 2000mA from its USB port?

I ask because I use a cable combination that charges and can be used for data at the same time to get around the problem that the unit does not provide enough power for my external DVD and older HDD.
Without external power the DV8P doesn't provide enough. Even with that combination I need sometimes a powered hub as well depending how much power is needed. The included power adapter doesn't provide enough power to run all same time. 

I have also seen that some people think they can run 2USB sticks, Keyboard, Mouse and external HDD same time just using the DV8P port with unpowered hub and are complaining that it doesn't work. :emotion-1:

I doubt the V8P can provide even the requisite 500mA from its USB port. When connecting  an OTG-Y cable to the V8P, the cable male-A  goes into the V8P power adapter, The cable female-A connects to your USB device and the cable mico-USB-male plugs into the V8P. The juice to power the USB device comes from the adapter, not the V8P. Ken C

And by any chance, have you tried running/been able to run a portable hard drive this way?  That's what I've read comments at Amazon.com saying they were not able to do, for some reason.

The highest-draw device I have with a single USB 2.0 plug is a portable 500MB Buffalo hard drive. It [impermissibly] draws 570 mA on start-up when connected to the OTG-Y cable and then settles in at around 380mA. Unfortunately, I can't tell if all is well because it became corrupted during the two years it just sat around.

It also shows as corrupted on my desktop PC and with the same current measurements as from the V8P power adapter.

FYI, this is the nifty meter I am using to measure current:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/USB-Charger-Doctor-Mobile-Power-Detector-Battery-Tester-Voltage-Current-Meter-/251570967031?ssPageName=ADME:L:OC:US:3160

Ken C

I can now answer your question, having just bought a WD Slim Passport 2TB external USB 3.0 drive. My previous USB drive, a Buffalo, failed beyond repair or recovery after very light use - like 20 minutes.

When connected to a USB 3.0 port on my desktop PC, the WD drew a max of 620mA.

When connected to an OTG-Y cable attached to the Venue, and using the OEM Venue wall wart, the WD again drew 620mA -- almost all of which I am sure came from the wart. Worked AOK.

I can also tell you that the Venue wart is fussy. When I plugged into it with a USB-to-3.5mm power cable, which I in turn used to power a small USB hub that worked OK on its dedicated 1.6A wart, the venue wart was unable to power the hub.

Ken C