Mac OS 9.2.x boot error

This item piqued our interest in large part because of the extensive testing the user performed while attempting to track down the cause. It would appear that Mac OS 9.2.x is sensitive to certain USB devices, and that those devices cause the machine to hang during boot. The hang begins with a spinning beachball cursor for several moments, then the cursor turns into a small bomb. Luke Hertenstein writes:

In two cases, I've isolated a problem with Mac OS 9.2 crashing because of a specific USB device. In one case, every time a particular Immation USB SuperDisk Drive was attached, 9.2 would lock up before extensions loaded (booting to either a clean system install on HD or a 9.2 install CD). In another case, the Apple USB Pro Keyboard was to blame.

Just for kicks, I put both devices, one at a time, on a brand-new G4-Quicksilver that has been running Mac OS 9.2 for several days without error; in both cases, the G4 locked up with the bomb cursor at startup. Interestingly, if I removed the floppy drive or pro keyboard after the bomb cursor appeared, the G4 would continue to boot without error (without me restarting the machine).

It is important to note that these peripheral devices work flawlessly (as do the G3 and G4 Macs) under Mac OS 9.1 (and have for quite some time now), and do not have a problem with Mac OS X either."