The visualtour page seems to imply that this works with 9.0, but it doesn't say if it works with previous versions. Will the reconnect work with 8.x (eg, 8.1)?
Sure, it's on the browser. When pgAdmin detects a dead connection, it asks the user if he wants to try to reconnect. See http://www.pgadmin.org/visualtour12.php, there is a screenshot of the dialog.