RE: auto switchers

Lawrence Watkins ( lwatkins@thepark.net )
Fri, 20 Jun 1997 14:56:28 -0500

Black Box makes a nice autoswitch called servswitch. Comes in 8 or 16
port-cascadable up to I think 255 computers! Not sure on the price but
it is very reliable.
Lar

> ----------
> From: jeff@tsns.com[SMTP:jeff@tsns.com]
> Reply To: ntisp@emerald.iea.com
> Sent: Friday, June 20, 1997 2:54 PM
> To: ntisp@emerald.iea.com
> Subject: Re: auto switchers
>
> problem with cheap KVM (keyboard/video/mouse) switches (Belkin
> included):
>
> if the computer attempts to load a mouse driver, such as when Win 3.1
> is
> loading or when 95 or NT are booting, the mouse will NOT be recognized
> IF
> that copmuter is not set to be active on the screen.
>
> That is, if you lose power, only one PC gets the mouse when power is
> restored.
> This is not a big deal for DOS boxes or Novell servers, but for NT it
> is
> unacceptable.
>
> Also, on the Belkin box, I have noticed a high failure rate in the
> serial
> port pass throughs. These seem to consistently fail after about a
> year.
> Furthermore, the boxes cam temporarily "freeze" when you are booting a
> computer or your active computer locks up, thus preventing you from
> switching PCs. Other than that, they're really not that bad for the
> money
> - we DO use these quite a bit.
>
> There are more expensive solutions, starting around $500 for 6 or 8
> ports
> that emulate a mouse on all ports. Look in the back of LAN magazine
> for
> the best collection of ads.
> --------------------------------------------------------------
> Jeff Weiss DiscPress
> jeff@discpress.com 61 Holmes Avenue
> 888-611-3472 Waterbury, CT 06710
> +1 203-759-0574 USA
> +1 203-759-0553 fax
> "CD-ROM and Diskette Duplication Services and Equipment"
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