MP 7,1 What USB 3 PCI expansion cards are you guys using in the 7,1?

[John_B Beta]

Am thinking about popping one in my 7,1 as have got too many USB bits & bobs that need hooking up to it & don't really want to use hubs if I can avoid it...

Seems like there's a gazillion different PCI cards out there to add more USB 3 ports to PCs/MACs, (just put a £25 inateck one in my 5,1 which is fine, but I'm more cautious with this new machine obviously) - wondering if there's any particular one you guys are consistently going for for the 7,1, or any to steer clear of, or if it really doesn't matter at all? [Would ideally like to avoid frying my new mac pro by using a crappy random amazon one - but equally don't see the point in spunking £100 on a USB PCI card when I could just use a hub and deal with some dangling cables!]. Apologies if there's a thread on this already - did a quick search and didn't find one.

 

[Aboo]

I’m curious about this too. I see that Sonnet has the allegro line of cards with both usb-c and usb-a port options but they are 130 dollars per card which seems quite steep.

 

[zhpenn]

For me, get some High-quality USB 3.0 HUB will be a better option.
a 4-Port PCI-E card seems not enough for me.

I’m using 3 USB 3.0 HUBs
a 10-Port Anker
a 7-Port TP-Link
a 10-Port UGreen
ALL USB 3.0 HUBs which give me 27 USB ports

I plugged two printers, Monitor lights, Keyboards, Mouses, Loupedeck Control panels and quite a few portable Drives, etc.

27 USB ports are more than enough actually because I'm not writing all USB drives at the same time at full speed, and most of them are just Spinning drive, so I will not worry too much about USB bandwidth.
If it does matter, just separate them and plug in different "MAIN" ports, or simply plug in a dedicated port just for one device.

 

[bsbeamer]

I’m curious about this too. I see that Sonnet has the allegro line of cards with both usb-c and usb-a port options but they are 130 dollars per card which seems quite steep.

Upgraded an MP5,1 to Sonnet Allegro USB-C 4-Port PCIe (USB3C-4PM-E) while I wait for W5700X pricing/availability. It's been a fantastic card and would recommend if you need 10Gbps USB-C.

 

[flowrider]

I'm using a Highpoint RocketU 1144C:

USB 3.x PCIe Cards for Classic Mac Pro

I'm looking for a mini PCIe USB 3 or USB 3.1 card that works with macOS. Do I need additional power? It will be connected to a powered USB 3 Hub. Thanks in advance!

forums.macrumors.com

Lou