On Mon, 18 Jun 2001, Jeffry Smith wrote:
> I was modem shopping on Sat (due to my last modem not surviving the last
> lightning storm) and, of course, am aware of the problem that most PCI
> based 56k modems are winmodems. Imagine my surprise to find out that the
> US Robotics 56K Pro modem is not. In fact, on the front of the box it
> said "compatible with DOS, Windows, and Linux"!
There is kind of a perpetual battle between corporate greed and the desire
for an actual working product in the field of modem design. They keep trying
to move functionality into hardware to save a buck, and people keep
discovering that such modems suck (regardless of OS or hardware platform).
This dates back to before Win95 existed (anyone else here remember RPI
modems?). The return of multiple OSes to the IBM-PC scene has only increased
the attention this issue gets.
The current industry marketing terminology seems to make a distinction
between "controller-based" and "controller-less" modems, the latter being the
cheap-as-[censored] variety. I have recently seen attention brought to the
fact that "controller-based" modems (both internal and external) work with all
OSes, typically "including Linux".
Now, if only we could settle on a sensible and *standard* improvement over
the NS16550 UART, I would be much happier. :-)
> (and then I went and spent the extra for the external modem...
I hope you spent a little more extra for a surge suppressor, too. :-)
> ... so I can watch the lights for debugging, but at least we're making
> progress).
Oh... you mean all those pretty blinkenlights are for *debugging*? ;-)
--
Ben Scott <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
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