1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
181
182
|
<!--startcut ======================================================= -->
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 3.2//EN">
<html>
<head>
<TITLE>The Answer Guy 31: 115K Baud from a Modem: In your dreams!</TITLE>
</head>
<BODY BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" TEXT="#000000" LINK="#0000FF" VLINK="#A000A0"
ALINK="#FF0000">
<H4>"Linux Gazette...<I>making Linux just a little more fun!</I>"
</H4>
<P> <hr> <P>
<H1 align="center"><A NAME="answer">
<img src="../gx/dennis/qbubble.gif" alt="" border="0" align="middle">
<a href="./lg_toc31.html">The Answer Guy</a>
<img src="../gx/dennis/bbubble.gif" alt="" border="0" align="middle">
</A></H1> <BR>
<H4 align="center">By James T. Dennis,
<a href="mailto:answerguy@ssc.com">answerguy@ssc.com</a><BR>
Starshine Technical Services,
<A HREF="http://www.starshine.org/">http://www.starshine.org/</A> </H4>
<p><hr><p>
<H3><img src="../gx/dennis/qbub.gif" alt="(?)" width="50" height="28"
align="left" border="0">115K Baud from a Modem: In your dreams!</H3>
<p><strong>From WEMehl on Fri, 03 Jul 1998
<br><br>
I purchased an <a href="http://www.ibm.com/">IBM</a> Aptiva last fall.
It came with a LTwin modem installed. It tells me that its max speed is
115K, but I never seem to be able to run at more than 34K. Is it the
modem (if so can I upgrade) or is it something to do with
<a href="http://www.aol.com/">AOL</a>? Thanks.
</strong></p>
<blockquote><img src="../gx/dennis/qbub.gif" alt="(?)" width="50" height="28"
align="left" border="0">
I think that this is a shameful bit of marketeering on the part of
whatever docs tell you this. They probably mean "115K if you get
better than average compression under ideal phone line conditions."
<br><br>
Currently the highest speeds attainable by modems over traditional
telephone lines is about 56Kbps --- and that is asymetric. In other
words you can download stuff at close to 56K under ideal line
conditions --- but your upload speed will not approach that (a
non-issue for most Internet "web surfers" --- but it would have been
a major issue for the old BBS users who used to run their Fido boards
and use QWK messaging.
<br><br>
I have no idea what AOL is currently doing. It is likely that they
haven't upgraded all of their modems (Points of Presence) to 56K
at this point --- and it's even more unlikely that they would have
upgraded their entire infrastructure to ensure that their hosts and
LAN's would have the capacity and bandwidth to feed those thousands
of high speed modems <em>at full speed</em>.
<br><br>
As for upgrading --- you can almost certainly upgrade your modem.
I've been working with PC clones for over a decade and I've never seen
one that had a *modem* hardwired into the motherboard. I've seen some
with inferior serial ports --- serial ports with buggy and slow 16450
UART chips that couldn't be replaced or disabled. However, this is
probably a typical internal modem --- just rip it out and throw it
away. I personally recommend external modems.
<br><br>
For real speed upgrades you can get ISDN and FRAD (frame relay access
devices) for PC's that are supported by Linux and can take you past
modem speeds all the way up do T1. You can also pop in an ethernet
card (10Mbps) and get an ADSL or a cablemodem (router). Naturally
you can't use this over your existing telco lines --- and you'd probably
really hate to see how much a leased line (frame relay) or ISDN (metered
service in most areas --- a penny a minute adds up pretty quick!)
would cost. As for ADSL and cablemodem services --- the coverage
and availability are pretty spotty and the pricing isn't what an
AOL user is likely to be interested in spending.
<br><br>
What really makes me curious about your message are two things:
<blockquote>
Are you running Linux? Is that a "Winmodem"? (The model
designation certainly sounds like one).
<br><br>
If you're running Linux to access AOL --- what are you using
to do it? The AOL reps I've talked to have shown <em>no</em> interest
in making Linux, Unix, Java, or other portable versions of their
interfaces avaialable --- and hostility at the notion of
documenting their protocols and API's to the point where anyone
else could do a free implementation.
<br><br>
<em>[ Actually, their Instant Messenger is available in Java, and
a recent note I sent their web staff asking after a Linux version of
the main client got a friendly "we've forwarded that suggestion"
note back, from two different people. So, times change? Meanwhile
<a href="http://www.winehq.com/">WINE</a> is
rumored to have some success with AOL. But if you're using something
Linux native, I'd really like to know what it is. -- Heather ]</em>
<br><br>
If you're not running Linux, and you're not asking about
anything that's even vaguely Linux or Unix related... why are
you posting a message to the
<em><a href="http://www.linuxgazette.com/">Linux Gazette</a></em> "Answer Guy"?
(No, I didn't pick the title --- my editors did that).
</blockquote>
As a final comment, I usually don't care much about questions like
this one. People read a bit of marketing fluff on the box or in the
ads for a product --- they draw an unrealistic conclusion based on an
interpretation that's best described with the phrase "wishful thinking"
then they perform highly unscientific metrics and benchmarks on which
the fail to perform the most elementary critical analysis (of their
experimental design, their results or their conclusions) --- and then,
unsatisfied with their results they write to some unrelated support
guy hoping for a magical incantation that will make the product work
as they <em>thought it would</em> from what they <em>thought</em> the marketers
meant in the <em>advertising</em> that they read.
<br><br>
If you're getting unsatisfactory results from this product --- talk
to your vendor. You paid them for it. If you're just trying to see
if your "missing out" (that some other people might actually be getting
consistent 115K throughput on these) --- don't worry, it's not happening.
</blockquote>
<!--================================================================-->
<P> <hr> <P>
<H5 align="center"><a href="http://www.linuxgazette.com/ssc.copying.html"
>Copyright ©</a> 1998, James T. Dennis <BR>
Published in <I>Linux Gazette</I> Issue 31 August 1998</H5>
<P> <hr> <P>
<!--================================================================-->
<table width="98%"><tr valign="center" align="center">
<td rowspan="3"><A HREF="../lg_answer31.html"><IMG
SRC="../gx/dennis/answernew.gif"
ALT="[ Answer Guy Index ]"></A></td>
<td><A HREF="tag_backup.html">backup</A></td>
<td><A HREF="tag_uidgid.html">uidgid</A></td>
<td><A HREF="tag_connect.html">connect</A></td>
<td><A HREF="tag_95slow.html">95slow</A></td>
<td><A HREF="tag_badblock.html">badblock</A></td>
<td><A HREF="tag_trident.html">trident</A></td>
<td><A HREF="tag_sound.html">sound</A></td>
</tr><tr valign="center" align="center">
<td><A HREF="tag_kernel.html">kernel</A></td>
<td><A HREF="tag_solprint.html">solprint</A></td>
<td><A HREF="tag_idescsi.html">idescsi</A></td>
<td><A HREF="tag_distrib.html">distrib</A></td>
<td><A HREF="tag_modem.html">modem</A></td>
<td><A HREF="tag_NDS.html">NDS</a></td>
<td><A HREF="tag_rpm.html">rpm</A></td>
</tr><tr valign="center" align="center">
<td><A HREF="tag_guy.html">guy</A></td>
<td><A HREF="tag_maildns.html">maildns</A></td>
<td><A HREF="tag_memleak.html">memleak</a></td>
<td><A HREF="tag_multihead.html">multihead</A></td>
<td><A HREF="tag_cdr.html">cdr</A></td>
</tr></table>
<P> <hr> <P>
<!--================================================================-->
<A HREF="./lg_toc31.html"><IMG SRC="../gx/indexnew.gif"
ALT="[ Table Of Contents ]"></A>
<A HREF="../index.html"><IMG SRC="../gx/homenew.gif"
ALT="[ Front Page ]"></A>
<A HREF="lg_bytes31.html"><IMG SRC="../gx/back2.gif"
ALT="[ Previous Section ]"></A>
<A HREF="./searls.html"><IMG SRC="../gx/fwd.gif"
ALT="[ Next Section ]"></A>
<!--startcut ======================================================= -->
</body>
</html>
<!--endcut ========================================================= -->
|
