I believe the best permanent solution is to buy a Mac.

Hello Clint,

Its a long thread but we have seen this with numerous combinations.  What has been determined is that this is (1) a documented function of windows, (2) some video drivers have the ability to override the windows functionality (presumably by caching and broadcasting the last known EDID), and (2) can not be directly contributed to a particular Windows configuration.

3 is particular to your comment as this behavior has been reported on a number of machines including fresh installs.

Notice that zBar (which more by luck than design) also provides a mechanism to solve the problem.  Again this program interacts with Windows 7's EDID polling mechanism.

To All Others:

I encourage everyone to see my previous post on Page 36.

I created a request for a PowerToy from sysinternals.  If enough people vote for it . . .

Also please mark my page 36 post as helpful to hopefully increase visibility. 

In the meantime zBar is an indirect solution.  Many thanks to Tom Revell!!!!!

Probably just because of the MASSIVE amount of development and testing that takes place on this machine. I am constantly installing new hardware, developing drivers, supporting new hardware and so on. Honestly, I beat the **** out of this machine from a "Let's see what this new hardware does" stand point.

Not to mention there is a fair amount of lock-ups that happen when developing software. Having to rudely power down a machine also takes it toll.

I have the same good track record as you on my other machines. Its just this one used for development that needs it.

"...Formatting a PC at the end of each year..." Why? I have an 8 year old Win XP, a 5 year old Win Vista and a two year old Win 7. Never had issues... Never have I formatted and reinstalled. I do perform some routine maintenance and scrupulously applying ALL updates, including optional.

Not automatically.  But they need to make themselves experts in the hardware related to what they do code for.  I write software for cameras and industrial robots.  That means I had no choice but to become well versed in photographic and robotic technology.

Now back to the topic at hand.

The problem with the KVM was resolved by formatting my computer and re-installing Windows.

That's right... Nothing was done with the KVM, the cables or anything else.  Not one bit of hardware change.  But the OS was replaced with a fresh installation and now all of a sudden it works just fine with the KVM.

I think this points to the same conclusion reached 37 pages ago... There is an issue with how the OS builds up numerous old drivers eventually rendering the OS slow and unstable.  We've all seen it.  Take a printer in one USB port and plug it into another: Windows will download and install the driver again.  The OS holds numerous copies of the drivers because it feels it needs one for every port a device is connected to.  There are a couple tricks for making Device Manager show you all the unused drivers.  When I did this in the older installation there were 40+ copies of the ergonomic keyboard driver and well over a 100 copies of "HID keyboard" and "HID mouse".

Eventually the system just gets so bloated it can't figure out what to do: Every device has been plugged into every port at least once.  Then a new device comes along and it too is "Unidentified device".  Only this time it isn't the unrecognized USB barcode reader, its the unrecognized KVM.  But windows already has an entry in its driver database for "unidentified device" on that specific USB port and tries to react accordingly.

Formatting a PC at the end of each year is something I've taken to doing.  And once again, it has resolved issues that I never expected to be related to the OS.