Belkin Hi-Speed USB 2.0 4-Port Hub - hub - 4 ports > Reviews > Plug it in and that's it!

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Speed
Ease of Installation
Ease of use
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Value For Money

Advantages:	Easy to use, can be combined with more hubs to connect 127 devices !
Disadvantages:	Needs another mains socket

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

With the growing number of USB devices out there, it is amazing how many PCs still only come with 2 USB ports. Once you start adding more and more devices you soon find that plugging and unplugging is too much hassle, and besides, you want to use more than 2 USB devices at once anyway.

This is where the idea of a hub comes in. This one converts one USB port into four. The downside is that it requires yet another mains power socket which you've probably used most of by now anyway! It can be used without mains power for running low power devices such as mouse, keyboard, etc, but for items such as modems, tv cards, webcams, etc it does need to be powered. When powered, it gives the standard 500mA per port.

Installation is easy, just plug it in and it works, no installation CD required.

If 4 just isn't going to be enough, Belkin also do a 7 port version, though this costs more. You can even connect these into each other giving anything up to a maximum of 127 devices per port! Now that would be a lot of wires!

This hub is USB 1.1, operating at an impressive 12Mbps, though if you really need faster than this, Belkin also do a USB 2.0 version for a little more of your money which runs at 480Mbps.

Very easy to use, stylish design and does what it says on the tin!