[techtalk] 1st time adding a modem to linux.

[Rik Hemsley]

#if Tania M. Morell
> I have a program called 'CheckIt' and it tells me that the modem's UART
> is 16540. That's the only reason I used that number. My modem's
> specifications don't refer to a UART at all.

Right. It doesn't use your machine's UART things because it is
internal, not connected to a serial port.

> There's a file "/proc/pci" which tells me it's on irq 5 now and that
> it's first i/o address is something like 0xe400000.  I've tried these
> with setserial to no avail.

Ok, this is a good start.
You now need to check your boot messages.

Z ~/work/cvs/kdepim/empath > dmesg | grep '^ttyS'
ttyS00 at 0x03f8 (irq = 4) is a 16550A
ttyS01 at 0x02f8 (irq = 3) is a 16550A

That's my mouse on ttyS0 (COM1) and my modem has taken ttyS1.

You should check in your BIOS that you have set at least some
of your PCI slots to be 'AUTO' rather than user-specified.

Sorry, I can't explain much because I don't understand myself :)
You should have a screen which allows you to look at a list
of IRQs and decide whether they're allocated automatically or
fixed.

Bah, I wish I knew what I was talking about. I don't _do_ hardware :)

Anyway, by default this stuff should be handled automatically.

> I have no other serial devices and both serial ports are disabled so the
> com1&2 ports and irq's3&4 are free. 

That's good.

> --There is, of course, the possibility it's a 'winmodem' but I
> --don't know which modems are and aren't.
> 
> The manufacturer doesn't refer to the modem as a 'winmodem'. But it
> could still be incompatible with linux..  I've spent hours trying to
> find out but I can't come to a conclusion from the information I've
> gathered.

If it doesn't actually say 'winmodem' on the box anywhere then
you can be a bit more optimistic. Still, you'll have to check
with the websites that were pointed to etc.

> --cua refers to a callout device.
> 
> What's a callout device?

It's just a normal port with a different name, but it's supposed
to be used to allow certain users to dial out (=call out) while
those that want to dial in will get the ttyS devices.

Someone in their great wisdom (ITO) (see below) decided that
we didn't need these anymore because there were other ways
of restricting users to dialling either in or out.

So, they're 'deprecated' but they hang around.

> --(IMHO hardware modems will ALWAYS be much better)....USR 
> --all the way!
> 
> What's IMHO?         :)  Excuse my ignorance.  :(

In My Humble Opinion.
Also:
IMO -> In My Opinion.
IMNSHO -> In My Not So Humble Opinion.
IMVHO -> In My Very Humble Opinion.
IYHO -> In Your Humble Opinion.

ad infinitum. If you don't know, guess. You're probably right.

Took me years to find out what LOL and ROTFL meant.

If you don't know, guess :P

Rik

-- 
Rework what others have exhausted.

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