Kensington ShareCentral 5 for USB Device Sharing (K33901US)

 (23 customer reviews)

I asked for and got a Kensington Sharecentral 5 for Christmas, and I've enjoyed using it every day. It has worked flawlessly just as in the product description. Its sturdy, well made. Truth be told, its really a super duper powered USB hub with the built in feature of being able to switch periperherals between two computers. I previously used several traditional powered 4-7 slot USB hubs purchased here on Amazon, but I had the same two common problems:
(1) when I plugged in more than three peripherals, the hubs would constantly shut down and start back up ever 5 minutes
(2)they were thinly made and the power cord would never stay connected (e.g. cheaply made).
The Kensington5 doesn't have these problems. I've connected peripherals to all the slots and it has handled all the peripheral combos I've needed. And the power connector stays connected - just like the cord on a well-made appliance.

And just so you know, if you have a USB powered drive that draws...Read more

I bought this because I have a Macbook Pro and an older Dell PC and wanted to share a mouse and keyboard without unplugging them all the time. I was a little concerned because I have a merc stealth keyboard and a logitech g5 mouse and wasn't sure how well that would work, especially since my older PC only has one USB port left that can recognize my mouse. It works better than I expected. My devices are instantly recognized when switching back and forth, and my keyboard doesn't even reset it's backlighting like it did when I had to unplug it before. I also didn't realize when I bought it that there are five USB ports. One of the four buttons controls 2 USB ports, so you only have to use one button to switch a keyboard and a mouse. Brilliant. I should mention that the orange LEDs are big and very bright, which took a little getting used to.

New customers should complain to Kensington directly. I was very disappointed to hear from Kensington's overseas tech support today that this product is discontinued and has no Windows 7 support. I always saw Kensington as a good company with long warranties and quality products. I suggest other customers complain about this directly to them as this product is being sold as new on their website and other etailers. Also experienced some Mac crashes when trying to switch (however due to lack of windows 7 support I cannot switch devices between computers anyhow. If it supports Vista, I dont know why they wouldnt support Windows 7 since the Windows 7 is basically an thinned out Vista. Trying to use this with Snow Leopard and Windows 7. If anyone has had any such luck please post about it.