ACC SHELL

Date:   Wed, 21 Jul 1999 23:34:05 -0700
From: Marc Merlin <marc_news@merlins.org>
Cc: linux-kernel@vger.rutgers.edu, Larry Augustin <lma@valinux.com>

There is an issue with setup.S:
! Set the keyboard repeat rate to the max
        mov     ax,#0x0305
        xor     bx,bx           ! clear bx
        int     0x16

Those lines  are not really  needed but they cause  a problem on  some (very
few) systems where every other boot (or so) the keyboard won't be found (and
has to be plugged/unplugged before it re-appears).
It happens to affect  some of the Pentium Pro systems  that VA Linux Systems
used to sell.
Larry Augustin  (CEO VA)  found that  removing those  three lines  fixes the
problem and VA has been shipping kernels with them disabled for at least two
years without any adverse effects.
The patch  actually got in  the 2.0.31pre series  (by David Miller)  but got
dropped/lost when David gave up.

More details from Larry:

----- Forwarded message from Larry Augustin <lma@valinux.com> -----
From: Larry Augustin <lma@valinux.com>

Specifically,  we had  the  problem  on Intel  Venus  (VS440FX) Pentium  Pro
systems.   I have  a feeling  the  problem could  be traced  to a  Keytronic
keyboard BIOS bug, but I never tracked it down.

Interesting enough, that was one of the patches david miller had in the code
base that got dropped when he quit doing 2.0 maintenance releases.

Larry