Hello Demetri,

Saturday, November 06, 1999, 11:36:21 PM, you wrote:

DK> "The Winmodem like many PCI modems are soft modems and do not have a
DK> built in controller to handle buffering."

DK> Can you explain how this deficiency will show in performance?

If buffering is not available in hardware, then it is done in software
or not done at all. If it is not done at all or done in software, then
the PC has to listen constantly to COM port (or to WinModem circuitry)
to receive information since any new byte arriving from the line
erases the old one. In case of CPU busy and the buffering routine not
being executed in time, some bytes are lost and the entire block (~500
up to ~4000 bytes) must be resent.

Hardware modems, as a rule, don't have any buffer at all since it is
provided by a i/o controller on the motherboard, independent of the
CPU. Some WinModems, AFAIK, do feature hardware buffer.

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