Minicom on A31 Debian 5.05

[Miller88]

I have a 5.05 Debian Lenny install on a Thinkpad A31. I am using both the onboard serial port and an PL2303 adapter.

The adapter and onboard serial are working fine; no driver issues. I can get into cisco routers/switches, Sun boxes.

However, I do have a problem sometimes with completely random devices.

Such as ...

• Aruba - When I'm consoled into a controller, I can see it booting and then the console becomes unresponsive when it comes up to the username login. I can't get it to do anything. I have no problem with puTTY on windows at this point
• Storage Arrays - Either completely responsive or "on and off". They will work to a point or not work to a point. It's odd.
• Break Sequence - the break sequence will work on sun boxes and cisco boxes. But on certain storage arrays (which use the same break as sun - #.) it won't work. If I send the break command CtrlA+Z F ... it will just "freeze" on me

I'd really like to get this figured out - I want to switch my main work laptop over to Debian but until I can get this stuff sorted out I kinda have to stick with Windows.

Any suggestions?