Question Is there any additional latency from using a USB port going through the motherboard's (Gigabyte B550 Aorus Pro AC) chipset VS directly to CPU socket?

TLTH

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Jul 6, 2014
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IMG-20210901-131343.jpg

Hello. My motherboard features some USB ports that are said to go directly to the AMD A4 socket and some that go from the motherboard's chipset over PCIe 3.0 x4.

I have an external audio interface used to record music. The interface itself only needs USB 2.0 data rates (USB 3 port advised for voltage), but nonetheless it needs to perform as quickly and reliably as possible. The audio interface's company is known for their well-optimized ASIO drivers, and someone with a decent computer might even be able to have usable round-trip latency under 3ms.

So basically, is there anything that might make it work better through the upper USB ports? I want to buy an extension cable as it doesn't have an on/off switch and I often disconnect the interface so it won't stay constantly on even when the PC is off, and disconnecting it directly from the interface's port again and again might shorten its lifespan. But I'd rather use a USB C female extension so the connection between the two cables would be smoother to reconnect, yet there are only USB C to C extensions which means either using the lower USB C port of the motherboard or connecting to the upper ports but with an A to A extension.

Thanks in advance.
 

kanewolf

Titan
Moderator
IMG-20210901-131343.jpg

Hello. My motherboard features some USB ports that are said to go directly to the AMD A4 socket and some that go from the motherboard's chipset over PCIe 3.0 x4.

I have an external audio interface used to record music. The interface itself only needs USB 2.0 data rates (USB 3 port advised for voltage), but nonetheless it needs to perform as quickly and reliably as possible. The audio interface's company is known for their well-optimized ASIO drivers, and someone with a decent computer might even be able to have usable round-trip latency under 3ms.

So basically, is there anything that might make it work better through the upper USB ports? I want to buy an extension cable as it doesn't have an on/off switch and I often disconnect the interface so it won't stay constantly on even when the PC is off, and disconnecting it directly from the interface's port again and again might shorten its lifespan. But I'd rather use a USB C female extension so the connection between the two cables would be smoother to reconnect, yet there are only USB C to C extensions which means either using the lower USB C port of the motherboard or connecting to the upper ports but with an A to A extension.

Thanks in advance.
Are you able to determine which ports are which on that motherboard?
 

TLTH

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Are you able to determine which ports are which on that motherboard?
At first I wasn't sure because they don't give a specific enough explanation, but eventually I figured it's probably the upper x3 USB 3.2 gen1 + x1 USB 3.2 gen2 as they are next to each other while another x1 USB 3.2 gen2 + x1 USB C are lower (uppermost are x6 USB 2.0 ports, which should actually go to the chipset even though they are next to the ports I believe go to the CPU):
IMG-20210901-131655.jpg

IMG-20210901-134424.jpg


Although I don't understand why one of the 3.2 gen1 ports has a white part plus why are the USB 2.0 ports on the back divided as x2 plus x4 from hub.