maparus Posted April 14, 2006 Report Share Posted April 14, 2006 I have my new computer up and running with mandriva 2006 only on it thanks to the helpI recieved in this forum plus I still have my old HP still sitting on the desk too with Windows XP on it. My cds that came with my HP won't install Windows XP on my new computer and I still need Windows for my HP 3500c scanner no drivers available for it yet. My question is Is there a cable adapter available hat will allow me to hook both computers to the same monitor so I won't have to keep switching cables around when I need to scan something And is there some way to connect the two computers so that scanned information won't have to be burned to a cd to get the information into my Linux computer. I know I can duel boot but I don't want to but a copy of Windows just to run my scanner and a new Scanner is not in the budget for now. many thanks maparus Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gul Dukat Posted April 14, 2006 Report Share Posted April 14, 2006 Yep, it's called a KVM-switch. At least, that's what they call it here in Holland. Don't know bout the States though. You can use 1 monitor, 1 keyboard and 1 mouse with 2 or more computers. I exactly use 2 of them. B) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mystified Posted April 14, 2006 Report Share Posted April 14, 2006 Buy a kvm switch. I use one and it works great. KVM stands for keyboard, video and mouse. I'd recommend going with a little nicer one as I had a cheap one and it gave me a lot of problems. With the one I currently have I just press a button to switch back and forth. Couldn't be easier. edit: Gael and I posted at exactly the same time. :D Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
daniewicz Posted April 14, 2006 Report Share Posted April 14, 2006 I have been using a $50 Belkin KVM switch for about 1.5 years with no problem. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maparus Posted April 15, 2006 Author Report Share Posted April 15, 2006 Thank you all for the information. maparus Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phunni Posted April 15, 2006 Report Share Posted April 15, 2006 I've had trouble with a Belkin KVM and Linux (despite it claiming to be Linux compatible on the box) - it made the mouse go crazy until I unplugged it and plugged it back in again... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gowator Posted April 15, 2006 Report Share Posted April 15, 2006 The KVM switch will set you back $50 or so, about the price of a low end scanner. You might consider eBaying the old scanner and getting a linux compatible one? It would probably end up being simpler in the long run if you really only need an XP box for scanning! However if you use OCR as well then unfortunately I haven't found anything decent in linux .. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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