USB 2.0 Webcam over CAT Cabling?

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Hi OcUK,

Hopefully some expert can help me out here.

I have put about 15m of Cat5e cabling through my granddads office, which is connected to a USB Female and USB Male on the other end, I have two wires going to each of the USB's one.

Now, I have one end plugged into a USB Hub to a PC, and other other end connected to a Webcam. I read on the internet this should work so I used it to test it out, and it did work, USB 2.0 Camera's, working fine with no problems, but then, I started to have problems, for some reason it wont connect to the PC anymore (XP) it just says unknown device for the webcam.

I'm unsure what the problem is, I have 5.1V going into the Webcam so it's not the power, I think it's where I soldered the Cat5e into a USB Female is unshielded and is losing signal and gaining interference.

Any masterful people have any fixes?
 
It will be due to the power not getting though i would have thought. Wouldnt an IP camera be a better solution than a webcam? they do not cost a lot anymore and would offer much more flexibility.
 
The cheap IP Cameras are really really crap. I tried an edimax one for £60 (Yes, thats cheap) and it was terrible. Worse than the cheapest USB ones.
 
Hm, I have the 2.0 Webcams already, so, would it be possible for me to put two Ethernet cables from the Webcam into a Network switch which then goes into the PC. Just to give hopefully less loss.
 
No - don't plug them though a switch - at best it wouldn't work, at worst it could do damage to the webcam, switch or usb interface...
There are USB repeaters available for this sort of thing (never tried them so don't know what sort of distances they can manage).
 
Another thing that may work is to use a long extension leas that gives you usb type A-A and stick a powered USB hub at the camera end. That way the camera gets some more juice and may work?
 
The problem with USB length is not just power loss, but also exceeding the spec for signal delay. A USB hub simply receives a marginal signal and retransmits it cleanly. USB repeaters are often just single-port hubs and needlessly expensive. For 15m just get 2 hubs and use 5m USB cables in between, with the final hub mains powered.
 
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