The NEXTSTEP/OpenStep FAQ

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5.19 Why does an unused serial port consume cpu?

serial port, cpu power usage

Perhaps you've got a (probably fairly long) unshielded serial cable attached to it, with either nothing at the other end or a powered-off device at the other end. EE's call this an antenna. It's probably picking up most of the radio stations in your area, which the serial chip is interpreting as a continuous stream of garbage bytes, which it feeds to getty, which tries to interpret them as login attempts.

How do you avoid this problem?



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