On Sunday, August 31, 2003, at 08:45 PM, chris wrote:
Er, not entirely true.
Now would I have said it if it weren't ;)
While in most cases you could get away with hot-plugging an ADB device, it wasn't really recommended.
I've been through this before.
Two problems with doing it 1: you risk frying the ADB controller chip
Not true. After it happened a few times on the first ADB machines Apple installed a thermally resettable fuse between the ADB chip and the ADB port. It *appears* to have killed the ADB but if you leave it powered down over night it resets and it works again. AFAIK that applies from the SE (or maybe SE/30) and equivalent machines onwards. I've certainly never managed to kill anything from there onwards, but i have had one (an LC475) flake out and miraculously return again the next day.
2: since it wasn't really designed for it, you risk locking up the ADB bus (or suffering the "slow mouse" syndrome where the bus doesn't freeze, but it does drag to a halt and things like the mouse move very very slowy)
Fascinating - I always thought that was because the mouse dropped to default sensitivity (i.e. throw a brick at it mode) when you plugged a new mouse in.
ADB was also limited to 16(?, 24? some low number) devices, where-as USB
has a max of 128 devices. Of course, I really don't know anyone that has
128 USB devices, nor even 16 really, so that count limit probably
wouldn't affect too many people. The bandwidth of ADB is also lower if I
remember correctly making it less than ideal for things like scanners and
printers. (in fact, the only non "input" item I think I ever saw for ADB
was a 1200 baud modem, that and some security dongles).
I never said it was *as good* as USB did I? I said it was USB before USB - implying that it was inferior but was also thinking way before it's time (after all - Apple invented it!!). I know for one thing it was certainly a darn sight more useful than PS/2 which ain't hot plug *at all* and *does definitely* risk blowing the controller if you hot-plug something - I know 'cause i did it on the k/b port on one of my PCs.
-- Mark Benson
AIM - SilValleyPirate MSN - [EMAIL PROTECTED] Visit FlatPackMacs online: <http://fpm.68kmac.com> Visit my Homepage: <http://homepage.mac.com/markbenson>
"Never send a human to do a machine's job."
-The Matrix
-- The iMac List is sponsored by <http://lowendmac.com/> and...
Small Dog Electronics http://www.smalldog.com | Refurbished Drives | - Epson Stylus Color 580 Printers - new at $69 | & CDRWs on Sale! |
Support Low End Mac <http://lowendmac.com/lists/support.html>
iMac List info: <http://lowendmac.com/imac/list.shtml> --> AOL users, remove "mailto:"; Send list messages to: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To unsubscribe, email: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> For digest mode, email: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subscription questions: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Archive: <http://www.mail-archive.com/imac-list%40mail.maclaunch.com/>
---------------------------------------------------------------
The Think Different Store
http://www.ThinkDifferentStore.com ---------------------------------------------------------------
