diff --git a/docs/rh-log.txt b/docs/rh-log.txt
index 7340d557e0..bb64a33b8c 100644
--- a/docs/rh-log.txt
+++ b/docs/rh-log.txt
@@ -1,4 +1,6 @@
 March 10, 2009
+- Added sdl_nokeyrepeat to disable key repeating in the menus and console
+  on Linux.
 - Added support for zip/pk3 files with LZMA and bzip2 compression to ZDoom.
 - Added more output to zipdir and a -q option to turn it off.
 - Added -u option to zipdir to only recompress those files in a zip that have
diff --git a/src/sdl/i_input.cpp b/src/sdl/i_input.cpp
index 249c71fcfb..572d381e6c 100644
--- a/src/sdl/i_input.cpp
+++ b/src/sdl/i_input.cpp
@@ -29,6 +29,7 @@ extern int paused;
 CVAR (Bool,  use_mouse,				true, CVAR_ARCHIVE|CVAR_GLOBALCONFIG)
 CVAR (Bool,  m_noprescale,			false, CVAR_ARCHIVE|CVAR_GLOBALCONFIG)
 CVAR (Bool,	 m_filter,				false, CVAR_ARCHIVE|CVAR_GLOBALCONFIG)
+CVAR (Bool,  sdl_nokeyrepeat,		false, CVAR_ARCHIVE|CVAR_GLOBALCONFIG)
 
 float JoyAxes[6];
 //static int JoyActive;
@@ -200,6 +201,10 @@ static void InitKeySymMap ()
 static void I_CheckGUICapture ()
 {
 	bool wantCapt;
+	bool repeat;
+	int oldrepeat, interval;
+
+	SDL_GetKeyRepeat(&oldrepeat, &interval);
 
 	if (menuactive == MENU_Off)
 	{
@@ -217,15 +222,34 @@ static void I_CheckGUICapture ()
 		{
 			FlushDIKState ();
 			memset (DownState, 0, sizeof(DownState));
-			SDL_EnableKeyRepeat (SDL_DEFAULT_REPEAT_DELAY, SDL_DEFAULT_REPEAT_INTERVAL);
+			repeat = !sdl_nokeyrepeat;
 			SDL_EnableUNICODE (1);
 		}
 		else
 		{
-			SDL_EnableKeyRepeat (0, 0);
+			repeat = false;
 			SDL_EnableUNICODE (0);
 		}
 	}
+	if (wantCapt)
+	{
+		repeat = !sdl_nokeyrepeat;
+	}
+	else
+	{
+		repeat = false;
+	}
+	if (repeat != (oldrepeat != 0))
+	{
+		if (repeat)
+		{
+			SDL_EnableKeyRepeat (SDL_DEFAULT_REPEAT_DELAY, SDL_DEFAULT_REPEAT_INTERVAL);
+		}
+		else
+		{
+			SDL_EnableKeyRepeat (0, 0);
+		}
+	}
 }
 
 static void CenterMouse ()