Question USB 3.0 PCIe card without power cable is a waste of money?

[KublaiKhan]

I built my rig before 3.0 was widely available, but it the motherboard does have two 3.0 ports, which may or may not actually run at 3.0 speeds . . . .

So I bought a PCIe card with four ports. But didn't get one that also had the SATA power cable connection.

Is it the case that I'm fine when connecting devices that have their own power supply, but not something like a little notebook hard drive that gets power through the USB cable?

Thanks!

 

[USAFRet]

I built my rig before 3.0 was widely available, but it the motherboard does have two 3.0 ports, which may or may not actually run at 3.0 speeds . . . .

So I bought a PCIe card with four ports. But didn't get one that also had the SATA power cable connection.

Is it the case that I'm fine when connecting devices that have their own power supply, but not something like a little notebook hard drive that gets power through the USB cable?

Thanks!

SATA drives would get power from the PSU.
SATA data cable connects to that PCIe adapter.

 

[KublaiKhan]

My confusion came from a review of the card I bought, suggesting it would be unable to support something like a notebook's external USB drive, which does not have its own power adapter. However, the manufacturer's website indicates differently. If you can get past the grammar, power does not actually appear to be an issue:

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