I'm using a USB-Serial adapter with great success, but the first one I used sucked ass. The first one I had the IS dept at work provided with the computer... don't know how it happened, but I seem to have ... lost it. I bought an IOGear one at Wal-Mart for $25 and that one works great. There is also a post around here someplace (or it was lost when the upgrade thread got cleaned out) that talked about a more expensive $50 one that is supposed to be more reliable. I just take my laptop, crawl behind the entertainment center, zap it and I'm done... If I had to pull it out I would still be dealing with the issues, because I must have about 50 cables hooked up to the thing by now!

Edit: I forgot to say that the first one that sucked was "Tripplite" brand.