Male to Male a to a USB Cable

Intro: Male to Male a to a USB Cable

Thought not that common, male to male A-A USB cables are used to connect USB devices to a PC or another USB device.
My old USB Hub need it for external power supply to provide full power to every port.

STEP 1: Materials and Tools

You need:

- 2 spare usb cable, or 1 spare usb cable and a type A usb cable plug (I've got mine from two dead mouse)
- a multimeter (a continuity tester works fine too)
- Soldering equipment (cheap 30W soldering iron works fine)
- Electrical tape or heat shrink tubes
- Wire strippers and/or cutting pliers (scissors as alternative)
- Hot Glue or superglue/cianoacrilic glue

STEP 2: Take Apart the USB Cable

Take the usb cables and cut the ends. Strip circa 2 cm of the external protective layer of the cable and you'll find 4 wires, each one colored differently from the others. The standard color of wires is reported in the images, but sometimes they are differently color coded.

Strip the wires, and using a multimeter find out the correspondences between the cables and the pins of the usb plug.

STEP 3: Solder Time

Solder the wires of the USB cables between them. You have to solder the wire corresponding to pin 4 of the cable 1 with the wire corresponding to pin 4 of the cable 2 and so on.

Now insulate the wires from each other with electrical tape to avoid any shorts. If possible use heat shrink tube instead of electrical tape, it gives a nicer finish of the wire. At last insulate the cable with electrical tape (worst option ever, with time the tape moves and it sticks everywhere), heat glue or heat shrink tube.

STEP 4: Done!

Now you have your male to male A-A USB cables, enjoy it.

P.S.: Sorry for the lack of photos of the steps, I've created this cable in a hurry.

Comments

[MikeW438]

do you have nay uodate for USB 2.0 And 3.0 ?

👌

[wongsukku3]

Yeah I actually did this without reading first. I wired it backwards and ended up frying things. Well, basically I thought the way a male to male connection were to be wired required it to be reversed but obviously found out. I thought the wiring had to be switched, I thought the male to male USB worked where the USB driver chip allowed +5v(red)----gnd(black) connection where as it actually works where the +5v(red)----+5v(red). It doesn't make sense at first because typically electricity traveling through a wire goes only in one direction, unless you want to blow up things. This scenario can only be explained when the computer controls the flow of electricity therefore allowing an AC connection. What I managed to do was to somehow cause it to over cycle and burn up. I welcome your thoughts please.

[Mr Tripps]

constructive?

[mrfinney11950]

How easy was that? Thank you. You have just made my day. This is just what I needed.

[BertC2]

[seamster]

Great idea!

Some shots of the soldering of the wires to pins would be helpful, if you ever felt the need to update this sometime. :)