Hmm, wonder if there's some common ground there. i'm running debian unstable. It wouldn't be so terrible except that there doesn't seem to be any way that I can start it (speakup) up again once it deactivates. I actually probably get to hear most of the boot messages because even though there are the "too many timeouts" errors it actually keeps talking for quite a while. also, would it make any difference that Im also using a braillelite 40 on ttyUSB0? That shouldn't make a difference but I'm just looking for some cause. -- Cheryl "Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also."