Has anybody tried this? Namely with large hard drives? I'm trying to boot to a 200gb USB External hard drive and not having any luck. I know the drive will boot/works because I've tested it on a number of desktop machine and it works every time. When I try it on the laptop it gives me a "No Boot Sector on USB Device". (Bios is most recent revision ... already tried to contact Dell ... don't get me started on that).

[Edited on January 27, 2006 at 5:33 AM. Reason : .]

1/27/2006 5:33:11 AM

Let me also add ... I have a keyboard with two usb ports on it ... if I plug it into the keyboard, then the keyboard into the laptop, it works every time.

1/27/2006 6:50:08 AM

the USB on my D610 is very suspect. On two of my mini-mice, they just up and randomly die. The only way to make the mouse responsive again is to unplug it and replug it.

I haven't checked for a driver update lately because I found one that worked, but I'm pretty sure there's some kind of issue going on.

1/27/2006 9:40:04 AM

the keyboard is just a USB Hub, you should try another USB hub of some sort and see if that fixes the problem.

You can get them cheap, < $20 or so

1/27/2006 12:15:09 PM

^
I've got a d-port replicator, which isn't a USB Hub technically, but I believe functions similarly. The keyboard itself is also weird, will start out doing transfer rates of 300MB/sec, but drops to 100MB/sec or less after 15-20 minutes.

1/27/2006 12:25:30 PM

^^^

Perhaps the bus is underpowered. I used to have problems with my USB stuff all fucking up every now and then because the bus thought the devices were drawing too much power and shut itself down. The only way I could fix it was to unplug ALL devices from the USB ports and then plug the ones I wanted back in. This stopped when I used an independantly powered usb hub.

1/27/2006 12:34:23 PM

Tried a USB Powered Hub. Same thing as the keyboard ... starts out fast and then drops. Also less power-intensive devices (256 usb stick) work every time on the Latitude.

Dell said it wasn't tested as a "feature" with Latitude laptops during production. No problem with Optiplexs trying to do the exact same thing. My guess is there's either something hardwired or they would have to issue a new BIOS revision to correct the problem. Both would cost some $texas. Bastards.

[Edited on February 3, 2006 at 5:49 AM. Reason : .]

2/3/2006 5:24:01 AM

I've had no problems booting with usb to a memory key or usb HD on my D610. Perhaps your USB HD is crap. But my mouse does that crap when using the docking station and moves my mouse pointer to the bottom left of the screen.

[Edited on February 3, 2006 at 6:14 AM. Reason : [/s]]

2/3/2006 6:13:40 AM

^
You getting consistent 2.0 speeds though? And yes the HD could be crap. Its a WD, though I'm not sure how they rate for external drives.

2/3/2006 7:27:58 AM