> -----Original Message-----
> From: PCBUILD - PC Hardware discussion List
> [mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of Cliff Mark
> Sent: February 26, 1998 14:42
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: [PCBUILD] Com Ports - How many can I have?
>
>
> Hello,
>
> Someone I know is having problems allocating Com ports as follows:
>
> Com port 1 - Mouse
> Com port 2 - Used for external "Ham Radio" device
> Com port 3 - internal modem.
>
> Needless to say the internal modem doesn't work.
> I thought you could only have/use  2 Com ports at a time? but he insists
> that it should be possible.

        It is possible, very possible. The problem is IRQs. Usually COM1 and COM3
use the same IRQ, 4, while COM2 and COM4 use IRQ3. This usually is fine as
long as you don't try to use two ports that share an IRQ at the same time.
To solve your problem, I assume that both COM3 and COM 1 are sharing the
same IRQ, all you have to do is change the IRQ the modem uses, try 5, unless
you have a sound card which uses it, or try 7 unless you have a printer port
set to actually use the IRQ, which is doubtful. If you can't do that,
hopefully the HAM radio device is a 16bit card, if so change it's IRQ to
something high, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13 are all possibilities. Of course, when one
changes an IRQ one also has to reset the software, with the modem an WIN95
this shouldn't be much of a problem to do. Hope this helps. TTYL