I have two devices with out aquabus cable between them, and all seems to work fine, what are the benefits of connecting them via aquabus?
A already pointed out by
Hufeisen and
InfoSeeker, aquabus (actually seems to be a somewhat customised I2C bus) allows You to connect several devices to a "Master" (Aquaero) so that those devices no are longer autonomous but become inputs and outputs of the master.
For example, I run 2 Aquaeros 5 LT (one flashed with slave firmware) and a Quadro, all connected by aquabus : my Aquero behaves as if it had 12 fan outputs, 16 temperature inputs and 4 flow sensors (whereas an Aquaero 5 has 4 fan outputs, 8 temperature inputs and 2 flow sensor inputs).
There are two main advantages of using aquabus :
- You need only one USB port for all the devices and since their number on typical motherboard varies from 2 to 4 it could be important. In addition some low-power aquabus devices can be powered by the bus so You can get rid of some cables.
- The controlers (input-output dependiencies) are device-bound so if You want for exemple to control a fan connected to one device wit a temp sensor connected to another it won't be possible if they are connected to MB. I am not sure (never tested) but even if I'm wrong a cross-device controller would need MB powered, OS loaded, Aquasuite or some other process running. On the contrary, with aquabus everything works as soon as the power is provided to the devices.
The main drawback is limited functionnality of slave device. As aquabus is to give full control to the master, the MCUs of slave device are not used. This means that the master has to do all the work reading inputs and controlling outputs. And how powerful Aquaeros MCUs are, they will hit some limit. The number of connected devices is actually limited as well as the total number of inputs/outputs : this is covered in chapter 23 of Aquaero's manual.
These limitations can change in the future obviously given that Aquacomputer will likely drop supporting oldest devices.
I use Aqaero 5LT and Quadro
In this case if connected via aquabus You won't be able to use RGPx functionnality of the QUADRO, all else works via aquabus. If You need RGBpx You have to connect both devices via USB (or purchase a farbwerk
Edit : it seems that RGBpx would work if QUADRO connected via aquabus you just cannot see it (nor configure) in Aquasuite.