[comp.sys.mac] Aboton Interfax 96... any problems?

dak@abbott.Berkeley.EDU (Dave Kearney) (03/17/90)

Greetings,

I recently purchased an Abaton Interfax Fax Modem.  When it works it
works great.  But it seems that almost every time someone sends me a fax
my mac crashes.  My configuration is as follows:

Mac SE w/ 20 Meg internal drive
4 megs 70 nsec memory
80 meg external quantum
Radius two page display

System Software
6.03 sys software running multifinder
suitcase II
Adobe Type Manager

Is anyone else having problems with interfax?  This problem is most
frustrating.  I have eliminated any viruses with disinfectant 1.6.  I've
called Abaton with no response yet.

Any clues

Your help is most appreciated.

Thanx

Dave Kearney




David A. Kearney                           MIPS Computer Systems, Inc.
mips.com     928 Arques Ave.    Sunnyvale, CA  94086   +1 408 991-0481
= I'm not a fatalist... But even if I was, what could I do about it? =

nazgul@alphalpha.com (Kee Hinckley) (03/20/90)

In article <37111@mips.mips.COM> dak@mips.com writes:
>I recently purchased an Abaton Interfax Fax Modem.  When it works it
>works great.  But it seems that almost every time someone sends me a fax
>my mac crashes.  My configuration is as follows:
...
>Adobe Type Manager
Don't buy a FaxModem without it!
...
>Is anyone else having problems with interfax?  This problem is most
>frustrating.  I have eliminated any viruses with disinfectant 1.6.  I've
>called Abaton with no response yet.

Problems?  Yes and no.  Most of my problems have been failing to print
faxes, but usually they aren't repeatable.  I suspect that it isn't handling
running out of memory gracefully.  I haven't seen any crashes on input,
although someone else at Alphalpha has seen it once before, but again
not-repeatable.

As for hearing back from them, forget it.  I really like the modem,
and the people at Abaton are really friendly, but their tech-support
people have called me back exactly once out of the 5-10 times I have
called them.  And that took the NE Sales rep (Genevieve, very helpful)
beating them over the head several times.  Just keep calling until
you get the person you need.

							-kee
-- 
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Alphalpha Software, Inc. | Voice/Fax: 617/646-7703 |   Home: 617/641-3805   |
| 148 Scituate St.         | Smart fax, dial number. |                        |
| Arlington, MA 02174      | Dumb fax, dial number,  |   BBS:  617/641-3722   |
| nazgul@alphalpha.com     | wait for ring, press 3. |   300/1200/2400 baud   |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+

ubi@ginger.sri.com (Ron Ueberschaer x4399) (03/22/90)

We bought one and had a problem trying to print a high-quality FAX
to our DeskWriter (the DW software complained "Not enough memory. OK?").
A snide reply from the Abaton tech rep went something like "1 Meg!  I
can't believe Apple even sells 1-Meg Macs anymore!  Get more memory."
I solved the problem by squeezing the display window down as small as
possible.  We now have 5 Megs and no more trouble.

The biggest pain with the InterFax software is that if you use the
modem for data communications, you have to keep going to the control
panel to disable the InterFax controller.  Why doesn't Abaton allow
you to disable it until further notice?  (Init/Cdev does the trick,
but requires a reboot, not unlike removing the InterFax cdev from the
system folder...)


--Ron Ueberschaer
  SRI International
  ubi@unix.sri.com

wlw2286@ultb.isc.rit.edu (W.L. Ware) (03/23/90)

I wish that the InterFax Control init would work like Timbuktu Remote,
which turns itself of when a Comm program loads and trys to use the
modem (or printer) port.. Shouldn't be too hard...

Lance

-- 
************************************************************************
*W.L.Ware                                             LANCEWARE SYSTEMS*
*WLW2286%ritvax.cunyvm.cuny.edu                    Value Added reseller*
*WLW2286%ultb.isc.rit.edu                          Mac and IBM Access. *

nazgul@alphalpha.com (Kee Hinckley) (03/27/90)

In article <10317@unix.SRI.COM> ubi@ginger.UUCP (Ron Ueberschaer x4399) writes:
>The biggest pain with the InterFax software is that if you use the
>modem for data communications, you have to keep going to the control
>panel to disable the InterFax controller.  Why doesn't Abaton allow

You do?  I use it with MicroPhone 3.0 all the time and never go to the control
panel to disable it - no problem.  I did have trouble with some DA that wanted
to access the serial port, but with MP it worked fine.

							-kee



-- 
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Alphalpha Software, Inc. | Voice/Fax: 617/646-7703 |   Home: 617/641-3805   |
| 148 Scituate St.         | Smart fax, dial number. |                        |
| Arlington, MA 02174      | Dumb fax, dial number,  |   BBS:  617/641-3722   |
| nazgul@alphalpha.com     | wait for ring, press 3. |   300/1200/2400 baud   |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+