clmanager%garfld.span@FEDEX.MSFC.NASA.GOV (Rich Drinkard (205) 544-2895) (02/29/88)
I just got a "Bingo" card through Byte Magazine with an add that states PC Industries has a modem for $169.00 that is fully Smartmodem 2400 compatible. Has anyone had any experience with this modem and do they think it to be worth the $169.00. Any input will be appreciated. Rich Drinkard Clmanager@garfld.msfc.nasa.gov
ccasttd@pyr.gatech.EDU (Thomas M. Dixon Jr.) (03/04/88)
In article <880228102106.33@Fedex.Msfc.Nasa.Gov> clmanager%garfld.span@FEDEX.MSFC.NASA.GOV (Rich Drinkard (205) 544-2895) writes: >PC Industries has a modem for $169.00 that is fully Smartmodem 2400 compatible. >Has anyone had any experience with this modem and do they think it to be worth >the $169.00. Any input will be appreciated. I tried ordering this modem. My card listed the 169.00 2400 and a $99 1200. I ordered. I waited. I waited some more. After about eight weeks, I called and discovered that the order number had no affilation with the company other then to take their orders and they were not able to give me a number where I could inquire about my order. A few days later I got a nice letter saying that they were sorry it had been nine weeks but that they had supply problems. The letter assured that my modem was on the way. After 12 weeks I had given up and was only watching for a charge on my mastercard. Soon after three months I got a nice letter all about how they recieved my request for cancellation of my order and refund. (?) I of course never sent in such a request. I was happy to note that I was never changed and thusly never got the refund I had not requested. I was simply jerked around for three months waiting for them to ship. So if you need a modem, Don't waste your time. I wouldn't be suprised to find out it was some bankers taking the checks people send in and skimming interest for three months and then returning the money. This company might acually be for real but in the words of my father, the impossible cynic, "You get what you pay for." And in the terms of customer service, this is very true in the case of PC industries. Thomas M Dixon Jr ccasttd @ pyr.gatech.edu still at 300 baud, and not happy about it. never came that there was now
dennis@uw-warp.UUCP (Dennis Gentry) (03/10/88)
Yeah, I had the same thing happen. I ordered a pair of their 2400
baud modems in October or so, and waited around until December when
they sent me a useless letter. In January I called them and they said
they were very sorry; they had lost my order, and they would be
sending my modems right away. I never did get those modems, and I
never did cancel my order (I was paying with a University P.O.), but
if I ever see those modems, I will be very surprised.
I called 1-800-USA-FLEX and ordered some reasonable little 2400 baud
modems for $175 each. I received them in 4 days. Some netters warned
me that these modems might die or be flaky or whatever, but friends
and I have purchased a total of 11 or them over the past year or so
and they're all going strong.
My only complaint with these modems is that they don't seem to be
capable of a complete reset when someone hangs up. So if someone
calls in at 1200 baud, the next person calling will get stuck with a
1200 baud answer tone instead of 2400. With Unix, this is not a big
problem, since you can write a getty shell script that just blasts a
capital A at 2400 baud out to the modem every time it starts up. This
sets the modem so that it will then answer at 2400 baud. With VMS,
I'm not quite sure what to do.
I used to think that maybe I just needed to buy the deluxe model
(2400EC, with MNP error correction) and it would support a complete
reset when DTR toggles, like the manual says, but then I bought a
couple of the 2400EC's, and they have the same problem. I haven't yet
had a chance to test how well they work in MNP mode.
I've finally decided to call the customer support people at Comark
(the vendor) and see if they have any suggestions.
To summarize, for use with a PC (where you don't care about dial-ins
too much) or a Unix system, these modems seem to be quite reasonable.
For use with VMS or any system where you require unattended mixed
2400/1200 baud answering, they might not be so great.
--
Dennis.
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