Posted by Jonathan the Red on February 18, 2002 at 12:25:38:
Inside my control box, I have a Hagstrom keyboard encoder (1 PS/2 keyboard connector, 1 RS-232 DB-9 serial port), a keyboard that goes through the Hagstrom pass-through but also has an integrated pointing device (1 PS/2 mouse connector), a trackball (1 PS/2 mouse connector), and an OSCAR spinner (1 USB connector).
That's an awful lot of wires that'd be running out of my control box down to my computer. I wanted to try to cut those down, if possible, as well as make the connectors available in my control box as available for expansion as possible.
The solution? The D-Link DSB-H4SMK. This is a 4-port USB hub that also has two PS/2 ports and an RS-232 port built in. It seems to handle the PS/2 and serial devices itself, making them appear as USB devices to the computer. Reduces the connections from my control box to my computer down to a single USB cable and a single power cable, and provides extra USB ports for future connectivity.
It's available from Provantage for $47.94. I've got one on order. I'll let y'all know how it works out if anyone's interested.