Ask HN: Is it possible to create USB terminal keyboard/display?

1 pointsdjl05y ago2 comments

Hi HN,

When my headless home server inevitably goes unresponsive after a power outage or something (I know I should get a better power supply), I have to fetch my big display monitor and keyboard to diagnose and get it back online.

Does there exist a device, or is it fairly doable to make one, which would be like a RPi-400 + display which could connect via USB to view and operate the terminal? I guess secondarily, a small or handheld terminal display is really the most important piece, since plugging in a usb keyboard is fairly trivial (could android phone be used for this?).

This seemed like a project that one of you smart people would have tried out, and I just thought I'd ask.

Or if there's a much easier solution than what I've been doing, I'd love to hear.

Thanks

2 comments

detaro5y ago

anything with purely USB won't work in BIOS or recovery system etc where a matching driver for whatever USB-graphics thing it is using isn't loaded.

If your server has HDMI out, you can use a cheap HDMI-USB-capture dongle with a laptop, smartphone or tablet. (small portable HDMI screens are also available, but for occasional use buying one is overkill). VGA capture modules are more expensive, but should also exist.

Otherwise a traditional way is a serial console, which again would need a serial adapter for whatever device you use with it - again depends if your hardware has a serial port and (if BIOS is relevant) if the BIOS talks over it.

ThrowawayR25y ago

Well, there exist rack consoles for datacenter use which can be found used on eBay. However, you might need a video converter since they are VGA only; rackmount servers only have VGA video outputs.

The least expensive option would be to buy a second small monitor.

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