Hello Brad!

Hello...

     BS> The umodem driver [perhaps the uhci/ohci driver] was a
       > little cranky in the 1.4P era.  I was unable to use my
       > uhci machine with a umodem while doing ppp.

   Thanks for your feedback.  I may stick to good old fassioned
   serial modems then, despite their relatively high cost.

I have a D-Link USB Modem that functions fine with the umodem driver.  I
use it every so often, mostly on my ohci based laptop, when the
PCMCIA/Cardbus slots are all filled.  It was very cheap and takes up
almost no physical space.  The probe looks like:

umodem0 at uhub0 port 1 configuration 2 interface 0
umodem0: USB SERIES Atlas Modem Board, rev 1.00/1.00, addr 2, iclass 2/2
umodem0: data interface 1, has CM over data, has break
ucom0 at umodem0

I don't use mine every day, but it is nice to have around.

     BS> The ohci machine has been updated to 1.5.1_BETA, but I
       > have not tried anything except mice and keyboards
       > since the upgrade.

   I've thought about using some 'legacy free' machines for a
   certain application.  Do USB keyboards and mice work well
   with NetBSD in your experience?

I have not tried a large amount, but my experience suggests that many USB
mice will likely just work out of the box.  If it says that it supports
iMac and MS-WINDOWS 98 then I think that you will be set.

I have only tried one keyboard.  I bought it at the Dayton Hamvention for
$5.  It is a returned Gateway.  Its probe looks like this:

uhub1 at uhub0 port 1
uhub1: Silitek Gateway Generic USB Hub, class 9/0, rev 1.10/1.00, addr 2
uhub1: 3 ports with 2 removable, bus powered
ukbd0 at uhub1 port 1 configuration 1 interface 0
ukbd0: Silitek Gateway Generic USB Hub, rev 1.10/1.00, addr 3, iclass 3/1
wskbd1 at ukbd0 mux 1
wskbd1: connecting to wsdisplay0
uhid0 at uhub1 port 1 configuration 1 interface 1
uhid0: Silitek Gateway Generic USB Hub, rev 1.10/1.00, addr 3, iclass 3/0
ums0 at uhub1 port 3 configuration 1 interface 0
ums0: Logitech N48, rev 1.00/4.01, addr 4, iclass 3/1
ums0: 3 buttons and Z dir.
wsmouse1 at ums0 mux 0

Note that it has a small USB hub in it and one of the ports has a Logitech
USB mouse in it.  Also note that since the hub is powered by the USB buss,
you can not use higher power devices with it, like a modem.

There are two slightly annoying things with using USB keyboards and mice.

1) every so often the USB mouse will lose itself.  That is, the mouse will
no longer track with the X pointer.  Pulling the mouse out and plugging it
back in always fixs things.  I don't know if the trouble is with XFree or
wsmux or wsmouse.  It doesn't happen all the time, and seems to be related
to acceleration and hitting the side of the screen.

2) Apparently USB keyboard events, and probably mice events, do not
register with some sort of screen blanker that exists on my laptop.  The
laptop is a Toshiba Portege 3015CT and this may be caused by a hardware
feature.  I don't remember if wsdisplay and friends do screen blanking.

   Regards,
     - Andy.





Brad Spencer - brad@anduin.eldar.org
http://anduin.eldar.org  - & -  http://anduin.ipv6.eldar.org [IPv6 only]
[finger brad@anduin.eldar.org for PGP public key]