Linux & USB KVMs

I've been trying to get a distro other than Mandrake 9 running on my machine. I use a USB KVM to switch from my gaming box to my Linux box. Whenever I try to run the install for Knoppix, Slackware, or Libranet the keyboard+mouse fail to respond after the kernel starts to load making installation impossible. What gives??? Has anyone else ran into these problems??? BTW, I used the usb.i kernel with Slackware 8.1, I used Libranet 2.0, and I used Knoppix 3.1 English 1-30-2003. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

-Mike