How to connect a midi keyboard,monitors & a usb mouse to a mac?

DJ Life & Community General Discussion
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How to connect a midi keyboard,monitors & a usb mouse to a mac?

Hey guys,

I own a pair of krk rp8’s and i connect them to my mac with a traktor audio 2.
Along with that i have a m audio axiom air. I connect these both using usb ports on my mac book pro. Now i recently just bought a usb mouse to use.

But since my mac pro has only 2 usb outlets i bought an additional usb hub to connect this. After pluging in my usb hub, my mouse and my midi keyboard would power up (light turns on) but the midi keyboard doesnt send signals to ableton live. Similarly, when i connect the audio 2 to the usb hub my laptop doesn’t detect sound card at all.

Though the monitors and the midi keyboard work fine when connect directly to the usb ports. : / What do i do? How to use all 3 at the same time?

Thanks

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possible you need to consider a powered hub as the devices may be drawing to much power for the single usb port on the machine also the two ports on macbook pro’s are not equal so maybe try plug the hub into the other port and plug the audio interface directly into the mac rather than the hub

3

You should get a powered USB Hub.

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Would a powered usb hub be better or thunderbolt wire to connect to the audio interface and the mac? Also does using the thunderbolt port suck more of your battery?

5

Just don’t connect the mouse, the trackpad is better anyways. My 2 cents…

6

hahah no, personally i feel the mouse increases my speed and convenience while working :stuck_out_tongue:

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Powered hub

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okay, can some one just tellme that would using the thunderbolt be better (in the sense would it consume more battery or less and would data be transferred faster/slower) or would using the powered hub be a better option?

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thunderbolt transfers data much faster but i dont believe the audio 2 has thunderbolt on it.

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Think he means a thunderbolt usb hub… in theory yes :slight_smile:

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Yeah i meant to connect the audio 2 to the thunderbolt port on the mac. :slight_smile:

Oh so basically thunderbolt would perform better but eat my battery up. :confused:

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Should i go for the usb 2.0 or 3.0? Since 3.0 is a bit more expensive. Which one do i need?

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USB 3.0 is more future proof, and offers faster transfer speeds.

I have my music and samples collection on a USB 3.0 external HD, and I find it much faster for reading samples than a comparable USB 2.0 drive.

If you don’t need to to connect an external USB 3.0 drive as well, then a USB 2.0 hub will work just fine imo.