On Sun, 13 Sep 2009, Pete Theisen wrote:
> Eben King wrote:
>> On Sun, 13 Sep 2009, Pete Theisen wrote:
>>
>>> Hi Everybody,
>>>
>>> I ran a screw through a brand new USB 2 cable, long story. Exploratory
>>> surgery reveals that the insulation is penetrated and maybe half of the
>>> shield wires are broken, but the copper wire and the aluminum wrapped
>>> thingie are untouched.
>>>
>>> Is it shot or not? If it was a shielded audio or TV cable I would just
>>> tape it up and not worry about it but I don't know a lot about USB.
>>
>> There are (up to) four conductors, two for power and two for signal. The
>> shielding's probably to keep the signal from leaking out and other RF noise
>> from leaking in. If the wires are intact I'd just tape it up (preferably
>> with some nonconductive tape, but you're only talking about 500mA @ 5V) and
>> use it like normal, but don't put too much stress on that part of the
>> cable.
>
> Thanks, I think I'll do that right now.
>
> I wrapped it with some aluminum AC tape first to replace the shield, now
> non-conductive tape over that. If my keyboard and mouse both start getting
> flaky at once I will know why.
Uh, wait, what? Highly conductive things next to possibly-frayed wire is a
no-no. If you must use Al tape, use something else inside it.
-- -eben QebWenE01R@vTerYizUonI.nOetP royalty.mine.nu:81And we never failed to fail / It was the easiest thing to do -- CSN
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