On 18 May 2002, at 23:32, Adam Lloyd wrote:

> I have a modem which I think have been hit by a power surge. The
> modem autodetects in Windows, but cannot be queried?? It does not
> respond. Does this mean the modem is toast?

  I've seen a couple of failed modems over the years, and typically
they talk to the computer just fine, but not the phone line.  So it's
hard to be certain whether this is the (only) problem in your case.

> If so what is a good brand to get?

  I've often bought modems made by "Best Data", and *usually* been
pretty happy with them.

> Also how do I tell the difference between a winmodem and a
> hardware modem?

  It's pretty difficult to build an external WinModem.  I've found a
couple of annoying cases where software wants to dial up the network
when I'd rather it didn't.  It has proved convenient to be able to
switch the modem on and off without rebooting the machine.

> After a quick look at pricing it seems winmodems are much cheaper.
> Do they work at the same speeds??

  There are two fundamental arguments against WinModems:

1.  For a while, there were difficulties finding driver software for
all but the most popular OSes.  By now, most WinModem chipsets should
have widespread support.

2.  A WinModem saves on hardware costs by doing much of the work in
software; the WinModem software is going to compete for CPU with your
other applications, and needs not just CPU power but CPU power *in
real time*.
  If your CPU runs at about 300 MHz or more, odds are good that the
software you will run while online will spend much of its time
waiting for data to arrive over the phone line.  So for most users
(with fast/modern PCs), this is not really going to be an issue.

David Gillett

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