it seems that most USB devices come with an excessive amount of cords which clutter my work area. I have a laptop and it gets very annoying. Some of the USB devices that I have could really use a shortening of their cords.
speakers and most cables can be shortened… but what about USB? would any of the devices lose their effectiveness? I have the Microsoft fingerprint reader which has about an eight-foot cord and really just requires half of an inch. if I were to cut, solder, tape, make it look pretty, would I lose anything? is it? even possible
Because I have six USB items which I use. I tried that and it became even more of an annoyance than just being able to push the cords behind the computer. Instead, I had five (the 6th is a wireless plug) coils I would be constantly moving around.
USB cables are pretty universal and many are SHORT. I was just cleaning out my desk drawer that was only 7 inches long and wondered what I was going to do with it. I would just buy ones with the size that meets your needs.
You can cut and shorten USB leads, but it isn’t always easy; there are four insulated conductors inside; +5v, 0v, Data(+) and data(-); the two data cables are often very, very thin multi stranded conductors and stripping them without severing the individual cores (even using a proper wire stripping tool) is difficult. Furthermore, the four insulated wires are usually packed in a grounded sheath; made either from foil or braided metal wire - both of these are hard to reconnect properly.
But if you have the technical ability to do that, there’s no reason it shouldn’t work; lengthening USB cables is problematic even if you do the job perfectly, shortening them shouldn’t ever be.
Lazy man’s alternative if willing to spend the money: buy a 7-port hub and a whole bunch of short (or appropriate-length) cables. Run everything thru the hub, using the shortest viable cables, and only the hub’s cable to the computer.