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I'm doing tethered shooting with my DSLR and sometimes when i need extra movement range I have to chain multiple active USB extensions cords with signal amplifiers. The connection between the computer and the camera works well using this setup.

The problem is that the physical connections between the cables are easily broken when stepping around them. I've been looking for cable connector protectors and there are a lot of them. Unfortunately they are very heavy and made for thick cables and often for outdoor use and not really ideal for studio use.

I'm sure there must be an easy solution to the problem but how can I solve it?

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  • \$\begingroup\$ How long does the cable actually need to be? There's a hard limit of 5m in the USB 2.0 specification and 3m in USB 1.0/1.1 IIRC \$\endgroup\$
    – James Snell
    Aug 12, 2015 at 19:28
  • \$\begingroup\$ @JamesSnell It's much longer than that. I'm using active cables with signal amplifiers. They work perfectly. The problems is to keep the physical connections together. \$\endgroup\$
    – Hugo
    Aug 12, 2015 at 19:30
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    \$\begingroup\$ Is gaffer tape an option? Fixes most engineering problems when things are moving and need not to :-) \$\endgroup\$
    – Philip Kendall ♦
    Aug 12, 2015 at 19:37
  • \$\begingroup\$ @PhilipKendall Possibly but I'd rather have a solution that can easily be taken apart and modified. And tape makes cables sticky :( \$\endgroup\$
    – Hugo
    Aug 12, 2015 at 19:39
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    \$\begingroup\$ The hard length limit is not an amplification problem, but a timing issue. The cat5 extendors work by emulating a chain of hubs, and that's limited by the number of hubs allowed. Anyway, you can get an extender that takes a single cat5 between them, as long as you need, up to the timing-based limit. So, no intermediate connectors and a light cord only. \$\endgroup\$
    – JDługosz
    Aug 12, 2015 at 20:14

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Personally I wouldn't protect them as the USB connectors pair comes apart easily rather than either causing a trip hazard which might cause personal injury OR risk knocking or transferring shock loads into your equipment at one or both ends of the cable. The fact that they are coming undone suggests there's enough stress on the cable to risk damaging something

If you feel that you must use a very long cable then you should look at one cable to run the whole length (including being taped to the floor.) That may mean grabbing some Cat5 Shielded cable and making your own long cable, picking USB baluns or using a USB over IP solution where you can use Cat5 cable and make your own to length (there are instructables on it). It won't meet USB spec but according to comments you're well over that anyway so it shouldn't matter.

You can also hook up a device like a Raspberry Pi (other systems are available) with USBIP or IncentivesPro and share the USB port in software from that device to your target. That would allow you to put your USB device on the end of a wireless-n adapter (say a 5GHz one to avoid interference from other kit) and not worry about wires at all.

Or Duct Tape... Duct Tape is always a solution, except when the solution is WD40.

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  • \$\begingroup\$ Gaffer's tape, not duct tape. Easy to remove, leaves no sticky. Also good for taping cables to floor to avoid trip hazards. \$\endgroup\$
    – junkyardsparkle
    Aug 13, 2015 at 0:09
  • \$\begingroup\$ Right. Gaf tape won't leave your connectors all sticky. \$\endgroup\$
    – JDługosz
    Aug 13, 2015 at 2:07
  • \$\begingroup\$ The duct tape part comes from a joke, it must be a cultural/age thing... \$\endgroup\$
    – James Snell
    Sep 11, 2015 at 15:42

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