boot process gets weirdly interrupted when using scroll lock

[deept...@gmail.com]

During the boot process, when rc scripts (or whatever) are printing
messages, I turn on the scroll lock. As a result, I stop hearing my hard
drive seeking, indicating that the system isn't loading. However, when I
turn off the scroll lock, the boot process doesn't continue. It just
hangs at the message that was last printed before I turned on the scroll
lock.

This happens when I turn on the scroll lock some time after "Creating
and/or trimming log files" is printed, but before the vty login prompts
show up.

At this point I can't use the vtys (login, switch). CTRL+ALT+DEL seems
to properly restart the system. But if I wait for 30 seconds, a login
prompt finally shows up.

The things to note is that (1) the text from the scripts never got
printed, and (2) the system should have been loaded in 2 seconds, not 30.