1) USB 3.0 is irrelevant, this is a USB 2.0 device.
2) Did you generate a config file? Pretty sure VH said somewhere that a config file will override command-line flags, so that's something to look into. Also "the bat file lines above" have only a single leading hyphen so either you transcribed them inaccurately or there should be a syntax error being thrown somewhere. Problems are easier to diagnose when all the data is correct.
3) One cgminer instance means one pool. It's possible to run multiple pools from a single controller if you run multiple instances, which is exactly what VH states how to do in the portion you quoted. Not sure why it wouldn't work, unless there's conflicting config issues or a hardware limitation (not enough RAM, etc).
The USB transfer issue has to do with the limitations of USB 2.0 itself, possibly exacerbated by the hardware or software configuration of whatever you're using as a controller. Additionally, why sell units that aren't working? If it's the miner itself that doesn't work, take advantage of the warranty. That's irrelevant if they do in fact work and the issue is your controller setup.
1) So even if we plugged these into a USB 3.0 splitter into a USB 3.0 drive that can handle faster data transfer, it wouldn't solve the issue. Drat.
2) Yup. That was it. I didn't have the double hyphen. I fixed that and it worked. Is the .bat file the same as the config file you mention? If not, then no I didn't. I don't know how to build my own cgminer and I'm using the updates VH is providing here. I'm not a computer science dude, I don't know how to code. I got these miners because I believe in bitcoin and I wanted to learn how to do this. I pretty much follow the instructions here to the best of my ability but most of it seems to be written for people that already have a baseline knowledge of this stuff and that means I'm pretty slow catching up.
3) He explained how to do that? Where? He said something about USB 1 and 2 commands, but going from there to different pools wasn't explained well.
Please don't misunderstand, I'm not at all worried these are defective units. I'm just not a computer literate guy who can figure this out easily. I'm perfectly happy with the pods and I am pretty sure it is just me having difficulty setting them up. I'd only sell them if I can't get them working, and I'd do that regretfully. Nothing to return under warranty because I'm pretty sure they work fine and the issues are on my end.
If any of you can explain how to set these up in simple step by step instructions, I'm pretty sure I could follow along. For now, I'm asking questions where I think I am getting stuck.
Here is the last log file of the instance I ran when trying 3 miners at 175.
[2018-02-27 20:10:48.015] Started cgminer 4.10.0
[2018-02-27 20:10:48.687] GSE 0: Terminus BM1384 Bitcoin Miner (10030015)
[2018-02-27 20:10:48.953] GSE 1: Terminus BM1384 Bitcoin Miner (10030016)
[2018-02-27 20:10:49.312] GSE 2: Terminus BM1384 Bitcoin Miner (10030017)
[2018-02-27 20:10:49.828] GSE 0: setting frequency to 100.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:10:50.015] Probing for an alive pool
[2018-02-27 20:10:50.078] GSE 1: setting frequency to 100.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:10:50.296] GSE 2: setting frequency to 100.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:10:50.296] GSE 0: open cores @ 100.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:10:51.078] GSE 2: open cores @ 100.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:10:51.078] GSE 1: open cores @ 100.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:10:51.296] Pool 0 difficulty changed to 4000
[2018-02-27 20:10:51.359] Pool 0 message: Authorised, welcome to solo.ckpool.org
[2018-02-27 20:10:51.906] Network diff set to 3.01T
[2018-02-27 20:10:53.031] GSE 0: start work @ 100.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:10:53.078] GSE 1: start work @ 100.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:10:53.140] GSE 2: start work @ 100.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:11:14.484] GSE 0: setting frequency to 125.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:11:15.875] GSE 2: setting frequency to 125.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:11:16.812] GSE 1: setting frequency to 125.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:11:29.546] GSE 0: setting frequency to 150.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:11:30.937] GSE 2: setting frequency to 150.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:11:31.906] GSE 1: setting frequency to 150.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:11:44.593] GSE 0: setting frequency to 175.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:11:46.000] GSE 2: setting frequency to 175.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:11:55.671] GSE 1: setting frequency to 175.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:11:56.906] Stratum from pool 0 detected new block at height 511262
[2018-02-27 20:12:22.453] GSE 1: usb failure (-9)
[2018-02-27 20:12:22.453] GSE 1 failure, disabling!
[2018-02-27 20:12:22.453] GSE 1: setting frequency to 100.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:12:24.250] GSE 3: Terminus BM1384 Bitcoin Miner (10030016)
[2018-02-27 20:12:24.484] Hotplug: GekkoScience added GSE 3
[2018-02-27 20:12:24.703] GSE 3: setting frequency to 100.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:12:24.765] GSE 3: open cores @ 100.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:12:26.515] GSE 3: start work @ 100.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:12:43.781] GSE 3: setting frequency to 125.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:13:02.187] GSE 3: setting frequency to 150.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:13:18.421] GSE 3: setting frequency to 175.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:14:09.312] Accepted 0b6e8269 Diff 5.73K/4000 GSE 0
[2018-02-27 20:14:34.140] GSE 0: usb failure (-9)
[2018-02-27 20:14:34.140] GSE 0 failure, disabling!
[2018-02-27 20:14:34.140] GSE 0: setting frequency to 100.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:14:38.921] GSE 4: Terminus BM1384 Bitcoin Miner (10030015)
[2018-02-27 20:14:39.140] Hotplug: GekkoScience added GSE 4
[2018-02-27 20:14:39.359] GSE 4: setting frequency to 100.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:14:39.421] GSE 4: open cores @ 100.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:14:41.187] GSE 4: start work @ 100.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:14:48.218] GSE 2: setting frequency to 100.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:14:48.218] GSE 3: setting frequency to 100.00MHz
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.281] Shutdown signal received.
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.328]
Summary of runtime statistics:
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.328] Started at [2018-02-27 20:10:51.890]
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.343] Pool: stratum+tcp://solo.ckpool.org:3333
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.343] Runtime: 0 hrs : 3 mins : 57 secs
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.343] Average hashrate: 120120.2 Mhash/s
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.343] Solved blocks: 0
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.343] Best share difficulty: 5.73K
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.343] Share submissions: 1
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.343] Accepted shares: 1
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.343] Rejected shares: 0
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.343] Accepted difficulty shares: 4000
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.359] Rejected difficulty shares: 0
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.359] Reject ratio: 0.0%
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.359] Hardware errors: 0
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.359] Utility (accepted shares / min): 0.25/min
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.359] Work Utility (diff1 shares solved / min): 1678.08/min
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.359] Stale submissions discarded due to new blocks: 0
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.359] Unable to get work from server occasions: 0
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.375] Work items generated locally: 18585
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.375] Submitting work remotely delay occasions: 0
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.375] New blocks detected on network: 2
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.375] Summary of per device statistics:
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.375] GSE 0 (5s):15.58G (avg):42.95Gh/s | A:4000 R:0 HW:0 WU:600.0/m
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.375] GSE 1 (5s):35.59M (avg):10.19Gh/s | A:0 R:0 HW:0 WU:142.4/m
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.390] GSE 2 (5s):41.09G (avg):45.43Gh/s | A:0 R:0 HW:0 WU:634.6/m
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.390] GSE 3 (5s):37.18G (avg):32.91Gh/s | A:0 R:0 HW:0 WU:459.7/m
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.390] GSE 4 (5s):30.38G (avg):29.54Gh/s | A:0 R:0 HW:0 WU:412.7/m
[2018-02-27 20:14:49.390]