tostan@mars.lerc.nasa.gov (Stan Mohler (SVER)) (01/15/91)
I was told by a pushy salesman that a brand new modem costing about $50, one of
those inexpensive internal modems, would probably be susceptible to
communication errors ("...there's alot of handshaking going on...") and that I
ought to forget about those cheap modems and consider the expensive used one he
had. Is there any validity to this? Do cheap internal modems perform poorly
compared to more expensive ones??
+------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Stan Mohler Jr. <---------internet---------> tostan@scivax.lerc.nasa.gov |
| Research Engineer, aircraft icing |
| NASA Lewis Research Center, Cleveland, OH |
+------------------------------------------------------------------------------+berger@atropa (Dire Wolf) (01/16/91)
tostan@mars.lerc.nasa.gov (Stan Mohler (SVER)) writes: >I was told by a pushy salesman that a brand new modem costing about $50, one of >those inexpensive internal modems, would probably be susceptible to >communication errors ("...there's alot of handshaking going on...") and that I >ought to forget about those cheap modems and consider the expensive used one he >had. Is there any validity to this? Do cheap internal modems perform poorly >compared to more expensive ones?? *---- In my experience, yes, cheap modems perform poorly compared to expensive ones. Here are the specific areas I've had problems: 1. The filters in my expensive NEC modems are much better than those in the cheap modems. The NEC modem will sometimes work reliably on a noisy long distance line when the cheap modems won't connect at all. 2. All of the RS232 handshaking and phone line signals are handled according to AT&T specification. For a lot of people that doesn't matter, but with a lot of commercial equipment, it makes life much easier. Cheap modems often neglect "little-used" (by Macintosh standards!) signals, or always assert them. 3. I have experienced many thermal problems with cheap modems, but have never seen them with the more expensive variety. The power supply is usually much more substantial on the more expensive modems. Conversely, it is very hard these days to justify spending $ 400 on a commercial-grade 2400 baud modem when I can buy two cheap ones for the same price (and Practical Peripherals offers a 5 year warranty). I tend to buy the good modems for critical applications, and the cheap ones for our casual users. -- Mike Berger Department of Statistics, University of Illinois AT&TNET 217-244-6067 Internet berger@atropa.stat.uiuc.edu