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How secure are your USB connections?

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CoryBee:

I had one of my bartops come back into my shop. Player one stopped working. Turns out the USB Gamepad got unplugged.

Has this ever happened to you guys? Or is it just a one time off situation? Maybe they dropped the machine or jostled it intensely. It was for a child....

I have remedied the situation by soldering the metal housing (ground) of the USB to the laptop's USB metal socket. Won't come loose again I know this.

Another time I had soldered the wires from the controllers straight onto the motherboard, bypassing the sockets altogether. This was done out of necessity though, there wasn't enough horizontal space available to plug in and USB cable to its ports.

 ;)

sandheaver:

Vibration can wiggle them out over time, especially in cases where gravity alone would pull out the plug if gravity were strong enough.  Some USB plugs/sockets just don't hold things tightly.  You should be able to fasten the cable in there in a milder fashion, though; solder seems a bit extreme. 

I use easily removable & replaceable methods whenever possible, just in case whatever's plugged in actually needs replacement.  Mild deformation of the plug or the socket will usually suffice and not break anything, but I try to use zip/velcro ties and creative cabling in situations where vibration is heavy and connectivity is important.

404:

i tacked a usb connector for an unrelated project using a bit of low temp hot glue. I simply gauged how deep the usb connector went in and laid some hot glue right up to where the usb connectors mate up.

I attached an image of where i laid the glue at. I would suggest that you be careful not to add glue to the bottom of the connector, the female usb connector on the motherboard have the physical usb connections on the bottom half of the connector. You could end up getting glue in your connections.

CoryBee:

Maybe soldering them on was a bit overkill, but it isn't going anywhere ever again. Would be easy to touch the soldering iron to the blob again and remove.

From now on I think I will just solder the 4 USB wires directly to the board of my Bartops. It saves space, doesn't take much time and a high reliability. Don't think it is needed with bigger cabinets, these just get moved around a lot and bumping as well as braking hard in a car can jostle stuff about if it isn't secured 100%.



brad808:

Soldering is probably the method I would turn to as well. Remember too that a lot of motherboards have those pins for the "extra" usb connections. Different style connector that might hold a bit better than the standard usb type plug. You could probably slice a connection onto there quite easily and not have to solder directly to the motherboard pins. That way you could actually remove it easily as well.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus



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