disconnecting keyboard: big trouble !?!

[Matthew Emmerton]

On Tue, 23 Mar 2004, Wayne Sierke wrote:

> On Tue, 2004-03-23 at 16:52, Shaun T. Erickson wrote:
> > Steve Ireland wrote:
> >
> > > This is a PS/2 thing, not an operating system thing. You really can
> > > fry your motherboard plugging and unplugging PS/2 devices while the
> > > system is powered up.
> >
> > I suppose it's possible, but I know I 've never fry'd one. I'm always
> > unplugging and pluging mine back in.
>
> I'd never fried one either until just recently. Of all things when I
> plugged a mouse back in. It disabled the keyboard as well. Luckily the
> 'fried' part turned out to be a fusible link on the motherboard and was
> easily repaired. This was an old board, though, and I've certainly not
> had any problems with more recent boards. I'm not sure why fusible links
> were thought to be necessary. Possibly it was the early days of PS/2 and
> there was uncertainty about what people would be plugging in to those
> connectors.

But of course, the best solution to this whole hot-plugging issue is this:

BUY ANOTHER KEYBOARD OR MOUSE.

What you would rather do?  Buy a $20 keyboard/mouse or a $150+
motherboard?

Heck, you can buy cheap 4-port KVMs for under $200 these days too.

--
Matt Emmerton