Question: I have a Toshiba Canvio 3.0 external HDD. It has USB 3.0. It flashes blue if you connect it to a USB 3.0 port. If it is a 2.0 port, the light becomes white.

Yesterday, I plugged it in and the light was blue. Now, I plugged it in the same port and the light is white.

Can I somehow detect if the USB port I just plugged in is 2.0 or 3.0? I want to know if there is a problem with the device or the USB port I’m using.

Edit: I’m using Windows 8.1

Answer: To check whether the USB device itself is USB 2.0 or 3.0, use USB Device Tree Viewer (on a computer). Then disconnect all your USB devices on the computer, and reconnect the USB in question. You’ll see it appear on the sidebar on the left. Click it. On the right, scroll down about 1/4 of the page. In the section ‘Connection Information’, look at the Device Bus speed. These are what you should be looking for:

USB 2: Device Bus Speed ?: 0x02 (High-Speed)

USB 3: Device Bus Speed ?: 0x03 (Super-Speed)

Another way:

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As mdpc said, the device you plug the USB device into should have different signs or colours to show if the actual ports are USB 2 or 3:

USB 2:

USB 3 (the sign on the left image says ‘SS’ and the usb sign. SS = SuperSpeed as said above):

There are many more methods here.Check Microsoft’s website for info on the different signs you can see.