My wife really wanted Rock Band for Christmas this year, so, I got it for her and it's in hiding. My plan is to get as much of it set up by the 25th as possible. I have a few concerns.

My gear is in a closet down the hall from the living room. From what I understand the instruments run off of a USB hub. What I would like to do is pull a long run of USB through the attic and down to the hub which I would like to mount just below the television.

Do I need standard USB on both ends or is like like the controller with standard on one end and mini on the other? Where can I find long runs of USB? I checked Monoprice and Parts Express without much luck.

FYI, the box says Rock Band 1 Special Edition.

The Rock Band instruments use standard USB connectors (not mini).

See the "USB Cables" and "Maximum useful distance" sections in the Wikipedia USB article.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usb

Sounds like you'll need several USB Extension cables and then a powered hub at your TV.

My gear is in a closet down the hall from the living room. From what I understand the instruments run off of a USB hub. What I would like to do is pull a long run of USB through the attic and down to the hub which I would like to mount just below the television.


Sounds like your PS3 is in the closet down the hall. Is that correct? If so then yes, you will need some long runs of USB extenders. You can find several of them just by doing a websearch. There are several vendors, including Gefen, which sell them. Just be sure you are getting "active" extenders. This means they are either self powered or draw voltage from the source device. Depending on the distance, you may need to place a powered hub, which usually uses a brick type AC adapter, so plan accordingly. For some installations of studio gear I have done which use USB interfaces, I have placed powered hubs every 14 feet of acticve USB extension cable. I have had some runs fail that have not had the powered hubs every 14 feet.

Edit: I do recall doing a couple runs that used the 25 ft. active extenders, plus the standard 3 or 4 foot USB cable, and they have worked fine so far. I use 14 feet as a rule now for guaranteed performance at work. However in a home environment I would gamble on putting a powered hub every 25 feet of active extender cable, since if it failed it wouldn't be any big deal, just my time and swearing... :D

Alrighty, thanks guys. I did not know anything about the powered hub, so, I take the I'll daisy chain some USB together and then that will drop to the powered hub and then the Rock Band hub will plug into the USB hub, correct?

Use this:
http://www.monoprice.com/products/product.asp?c_id=103&cp_id=10303&cs_id=1030304&p_id=1986&seq=1&format=2

And the powered hub that comes with Rock Band.

Thanks. Can I link two of those together or should I do one of those and 1 standard USB?

For some reason, 10 feet extension or a total of 16 is the max the PS3 will handle extensions, especially with power. I observed this with the PS3 Eye. I even tried the Belkin powered extension hub at I think 20' and the PS3 fails to see anything connected.

So how were you able to configure this to work with your needS?

I ended up taking Rockband back and traded it in for Rockband 2. Hopefully it will be a better match. From the box it looks like the mic is still hard wired so I may get one of the extended USB cables for that,but, I don't expect her ( or me) to do much singing.

I've not had much exposure to Rockband. If somebody is not singing or playing an instrument etc. is that filled in on the soundtrack? I'm planning on getting the big honking box out of the attic on Christmas Eve after she goes to bed and getting everything plugged up so it can charge overnight. Then, I'm going to wrap the disc in a smallish box. She seems to suspect I got it for her so I need to find a way to wrap it to really throw her off.

Last year I bought the available Harry Potter movies on HD DVD for her and wrapped one up in about a million layers of wrapping paper, shopping bags, tissue paper and then stuffed it in a bigger box with many layers of the same under the disc. Under those layers were the other movies, each wrapped up as much as the first. I bet it took a good 20 minutes to unwrap everything ;)

I hope you bought Rockband 2 over at Toys R Us, or used Sunday's flyer to price match somewhere else. $109.99 plus a $25 gift card back at Toys R Us for Rockband 2 for the PS3 and Xbox.

I have 2 15' usb extension cables and I haven't had any trouble, although I was only charging/using both of my controllers.

I hope you bought Rockband 2 over at Toys R Us, or used Sunday's flyer to price match somewhere else. $109.99 plus a $25 gift card back at Toys R Us for Rockband 2 for the PS3 and Xbox.

HOLY CRAP, I dropped $190 for it.

Her birthday is next month so I'm getting her the cymbal add on pack then. Do the drums / guitar charges work the same as the regular controllers? Does the charge last as long?

Do the drums / guitar charges work the same as the regular controllers? Does the charge last as long?

No the drums and guitars use 2 double A batteries. I'm not sure how long the batteries usually last, but I usually play a few hours every weekend since RB2 came out back in Oct. and I'm still using the original batteries.

I also hope you got the RB2 guitars (or the Guitar Hero guitars) instead of the RB1 guitars. They are much better made. The tilt sensor works much better, the strum bar is more solid, and the auto-calibration is fantastic, and the fret buttons are MUCH quieter.

AA batteries, do they come with or should I have some on hand?

AA batteries, do they come with or should I have some on hand?

Yeah the batteries come with the drums/guitars.

Good to know, thanks!