970A-UD3 board USB ports active before USB3 driver install?

[plainolguy]

Hi All:

On Gigabyte`s website in the specification notes for my soon to arrive GA-970A-UD3 board, it says to "(Note 4) Be sure to connect your USB device(s) to the USB 2.0/1.1 ports before the USB 3.0 driver is installed.". Does this mean I should find a USB device for each and every port on the MB so that the drivers will detect all ports or is only 1 port enough or what? I know it is perfectly clear to whomever wrote the note and I appreciate the heads up but I am confused nonetheless. Thanks for any help ya`ll can give. I searched but didn`t find a thread for this question even though there are probably dozens.

Also, this leads me to believe there is the possibility I must keep some ports USB2 reserved. Is this true or will the new drivers take care of this and let me use USB2 stuff in any port?

plain

[Conners]

Ugh no you'll be fine it will be backwards compatable.

[plainolguy]

Okay but about the note, should I connect a device to each port before installing USB3 drivers? That doesn`t seem rational but who knows? Thanks

[Conners]

Don't think so once the driver is installed it should work on all 3.0 ports...

[- wardog -]

Na, I'd simply install the driver w/o having a device in the 2.0/1.1 positions.

The USB 3.0 on your board is supplied by the Etron EJ168, not the south bridge.

That Note 4 makes absolutely no sense to me. On my Extreme4 and UD5, both having the same EJ168 USB 3.0 controller I just installed away w/o ever noticing.

[plainolguy]

Okay Conners and wardog, Thanks for helping me out. I don`t get it either.

[Vinster]

looking at the note a little closer I'd read that as don't use the USB3.0 port before instaling the USB3.0 driver...

so you won't get any keyboard or mouse functionality during the windows installation as the US3.0 drivers are not within the microsoft repository yet.

Once the driver is installed, you're fine

Vin

[plainolguy]

Thanks Vinster. I have another question but will start a new thread.

plain

[profJim]

There were reported usb 3.0 problems early on with some Gigabyte z77 motherboards.
I did some checking and found the following notes on the official web page and in the motherboard user manual:

Due to a Windows 7 limitation, please connect your USB device(s) to the USB 2.0/1.1 port(s) before the Intel USB 3.0 controller driver is installed.

The wording was confusing, but I pointed out that this might be a possible cause of the problem. The bottom line is that when you only use the usb 2.0 ports while you are installing the usb 3.0 drivers, all usb ports will/should be usable when the initial usb 3.0 driver update has completed.