> Unfortunately I don't have a data scope, or even a working oscilloscope
> at the moment, though my trusty RS-232 breakout box is hinting to me
> that the PC is dropping RTS after accepting the first character of
> input

I use a three wire cabling, as my DEC VT420 doesn't do RTS/CTS.
This works fine. 

What happens if someone switches off the console when you have RTS/CTS
handshake? You'll probably block your system rock solid at the next
kernel printf...


Martin