Hacking a USB hub to add internal ports to a Toshiba Satelite (or other laptop)

Okay so some of us are tired of all our flash drives and wireless dongles hanging off our laptop all the time!
on most laptops this can be easily taken care of by modding the guts of your laptop - we will be doing it only with USB so no risk of electrocution or injury (unless you are truly an idiot) ****Do not do this if you are afraid of hurting your lappy or yourself - the tutorial will be detailed but i accept no responsibility for broken damaged electronics or humans**** now on to the fun stuff.


we don't want to use a ton of hubs and yet we still want access to our main USB ports.

Step 1 Supplies

1. hot glue
2. screwdriver (might need mini or precision depending on laptop)
3. usb hub (small)
4. usb bluetooth/wifi dongle or flash drive
5. solder
6. soldering iron
7 misc. items depending on the difference of your mod

talents: simple soldering, safe glue gun use, laptop disassembly (easy)

Comments

[geunsjl]

Hi, nice tutorial, but when you solder the hub to a usb port, can you still use the usb port you soldered to?

[zapskate]

no that one will not work unless you add a switch to switch off the hub then it will work or if you disconnect that port and wire it to one of the hubs ports then it would also work

[tinker234]

wow thank you i hope now i can add a webcam to my computer

[spockofborg]

Nice mod, Zapskate.  

I found the 31-port hub here: http://www.cad.t.u-tokyo.ac.jp/~shun/etc/20050720_usb_hub.html. Fascinating, but the bottleneck is horrible - i.e. no good for a flash raid array.

[zapskate]

so nobody read the title? you just click on random cool pictures? the title says exactly what it is - i will remove the pic tomorrow.

[your_dragon113]

The Pic you have shown, with the mega USB powered hub, shows nothing about what you instructable is and is very misleading. I think it would be a good time to remove the pic and show what it is that you've done OR remove the Instructable.

[asteidl]

Got a link to a project to make the "uber" hub in the intro pic?

[zapskate]

no it don't but you could probably google it i don't know if it is a kit or what - it is a 32 port usb hub powered of course -

[hightekrednek2396]

That first picture is misleading. I thought thats what you made

[alex-sharetskiy]

Me too

[hightekrednek2396]

yep

[zapskate]

true i didn't make it and it has little to do with the project except for being a USB hub it is just a cool pic - i will consider removing it, Thank You!