Picture a day in the future: You just plunked down the meager remains of your 401k on the brand-new PC you've been dreaming about with the Pentium 6, 9-kHz processor, 350G-byte hard drive and 2048M bytes of RAM, and out of pity they even threw in 21-in. monitor. Strangely, you still find yourself sentimentally attached to the old, reliable PC -- and its data -- and would love an easy way to use them both.
Recognizing that someone needs to serve the nerds...ahem, I mean home computing 'power users' out there, Belkin has developed what it calls its OmniView line of KVM (keyboard, video, mouse) switches, enabling two or more computers to share a single monitor, keyboard and mouse. In fact, the model we tested allows two computers to share USB devices, speakers and a microphone.
For our test, we hooked up our OmniView to one relatively new PC and a much older unit that practically runs on diesel fuel. Belkin was kind enough to provide us with two KVM Cable Kits, but since the required cables linking the OmniView to the PCs aren't included, you'll need to spend an extra $70 or so to make the gizmo work.
The setup process is not difficult because Belkin has color-coded and labeled all the plugs and cables, but beware of the spaghetti ball of cords you'll have when finished. After gently snapping the cover in place, the OmniView looks very futuristic and occupies about as much space as a large coffee mug, which is minimal, since you're gaining space by using one set of peripherals.
Upon plugging it in and then turning on both your computers, you'll find that with the press of a button you can go from typing a document on one computer to playing your favorite video game on the other. Though the age of our PCs may be partly to blame, we found that the OmniView tends to be fussy when only used to share one or two devices (i.e. just a monitor), or when one computer is turned off. So, even though it's not exactly cheap, and getting everything plugged together can be a pain, technophiles may not be able to resist the convenience and saved space that Belkin's OmniView provides.
