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List USB Devices from Command Line

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I was recently creating a Recalbox with my 5 year old son and it was an awesome experience; I saw the excitement and curiosity in his eyes while helping him put together a video game machine. We added NES, SNES, and Nintendo 64 games to the device but it became apparent that the N64 controller needed its buttons reconfigured in a config file. To do so I needed to know the device's USB name.

You can use the following command line execution to get the listing of connected USB devices:

system_profiler SPUSBDataType

# >>
USB:

    USB 3.0 Bus:

      Host Controller Driver: AppleUSBXHCISPTLP
      PCI Device ID: 0x9d2f
      PCI Revision ID: 0x0021
      PCI Vendor ID: 0x8086

        Generic   USB  Joystick  :

          Product ID: 0x0006
          Vendor ID: 0x0079
          Version: 1.07
          Speed: Up to 1.5 Mb/sec
          Manufacturer: DragonRise Inc.
          Location ID: 0x14400000 / 2
          Current Available (mA): 500
          Current Required (mA): 500
          Extra Operating Current (mA): 0

        iBridge:

          Product ID: 0x8600
          Vendor ID: 0x05ac (Apple Inc.)
          Version: 1.01
          Manufacturer: Apple Inc.
          Location ID: 0x14100000

    USB 3.1 Bus:

      Host Controller Driver: AppleUSBXHCIAR
      PCI Device ID: 0x15d4
      PCI Revision ID: 0x0002
      PCI Vendor ID: 0x8086
      Bus Number: 0x00

    USB 3.1 Bus:

      Host Controller Driver: AppleUSBXHCIAR
      PCI Device ID: 0x15d4
      PCI Revision ID: 0x0002
      PCI Vendor ID: 0x8086
      Bus Number: 0x01

There are methods of viewing connected USB devices via an operating system UI but knowing how to quickly get that information via command line. It's also much easier to copy and paste that data if you need to pass it on!

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Discussion

  1. André Jaenisch

    Hi David,

    on GNU/Linux you have several options.

    The CLI one being lsusb:
    https://wiki.debian.org/HowToIdentifyADevice/USB

    Takes a bit to read it, though…

    Kind regards

    André

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