US Robotics 56k Modems(usr.com)
usr.com
US Robotics 56k Modems
https://www.usr.com/products/56k-dialup-modem/
136 comments
HS-Link was the best. You could upload and download at the same time which with zmodem you could not. Also, if you were using hs-link, you were definitely not downloading "tradewars 2002" tradew4rez maybe
By 1990 I was in university with 10BaseT available.
So my peak modem experience was probably 9600 baud modems with Zmodem for transfer protocols. I think there were 14.4 modems available then but I don't recall that I owned one.
So my peak modem experience was probably 9600 baud modems with Zmodem for transfer protocols. I think there were 14.4 modems available then but I don't recall that I owned one.
I got to experience so many different remote access methods in my life - modems to bbs, direct dial to Unix system, slirp on said Unix system, dedicated 56k modem to home network, upgraded to dsl, finally college and Ethernet. So many discarded technologies…
> slirp on said Unix system,
Byte magazine, in their February 1997 issue, had a look at the "new" PPP protocol (p. 55):
* https://vintageapple.org/byte/pdf/199702_Byte_Magazine_Vol_2...
Byte magazine, in their February 1997 issue, had a look at the "new" PPP protocol (p. 55):
* https://vintageapple.org/byte/pdf/199702_Byte_Magazine_Vol_2...
IceModem was always the one that I remembered that was a good alternative to Zmodem
If your modem was US Robotics, your parents had money. If it was 3Com, your dad was an executive. If you had a WinModem, you bought it at the computer show along with some Microsoft Office OEM CDs with no license key.
Or you got into carding so you could be a courier...
US Robotics was the Cadillac of modems back in the day, that's for sure. I never had one, but Zoom gave you pretty nice bang for your buck.
US Robotics was the Cadillac of modems back in the day, that's for sure. I never had one, but Zoom gave you pretty nice bang for your buck.
I still have my USR Courier :)
It would be fun to test if it would still work but I have no landline anymore and I'm not sure where to dial too.
It would be fun to test if it would still work but I have no landline anymore and I'm not sure where to dial too.
There are still BBSes running with dialup lines. See https://www.telnetbbsguide.com/connection/dial-up/
My USR Courier and solid ISP would allow me to rock a 185 ping in Quake 1. So many fond memories of those devices.
Zoom was my go-to brand. They were decently well built and inexpensive.
I think the first US Robotics product I bought was a Palm Pilot.
Firmware upgradeable 33.6k "Sportster" with the promise of a rebate on the front of the box.... no actual rebate coupon IN the box... and it's not like any of my friends actually received their rebates anyway.
Trying to get that thing to run on Linux via LinModem was fun.
Trying to get that thing to run on Linux via LinModem was fun.
And let me tell you, Redhat 6 did not like the Winmodem
If I recall correctly, wasn't that because WinModem was a software modem whereas USR modems were hardware modems? The WinModems were a glorified single chip on a board (analog <-> digital converter), with all the actual work being in the Windows Drivers.
Which on modern computers wouldn't be a big deal (see modern onboard sound) but back then a slower computer actually could mean slower data rates.
Which on modern computers wouldn't be a big deal (see modern onboard sound) but back then a slower computer actually could mean slower data rates.
There was a way to get the winmodems working on Linux. Lots of fun with configuring obscure drivers, I/O base address, DMA channels, etc. https://tldp.org/HOWTO/pdf/Winmodems-and-Linux-HOWTO.pdf
I recall the big transition from 2400 to 9600, and as a teenager I couldn’t afford any of the modems. But then IIRC CompuCom came along with a much more affordable 9600 modem, with the catch that it could only talk to other CompuComs, which my local BBS offered special numbers for. I can tell you going from 2400 to 9600 was massively beneficial, much like my first “broadband” experience. Every bump since then has been marginal improvement, really.
Before internet smart people went for Supra modems, performance at a budget.
History of Supra Corporation from Japanese perspective https://ascii-jp.translate.goog/elem/000/001/425/1425488/?_x...
History of Supra Corporation from Japanese perspective https://ascii-jp.translate.goog/elem/000/001/425/1425488/?_x...
Thank you for that Link. Supra FaxModem v32bis was what got me into BBS scene back in the early 90s
I guess the Rockwell chipset based would be "middle class". But what about Zyxel?
In Europe, Zyxel was top of the line at the time, Elite class.
I had a Zoom external 56k. My internal 14.4 went kaputski and to replace it I went external because by that time, all the internal modems were WinModems and I had Linux.
My firs modem was an Atari 835 300 baud modem, but the second was a Zoom 300baud, in a smoked black transparent case. I loved that thing.
I’m surprised I’ve gotten this far and no one has mentioned the 16550 UART requirement for external modems above 9600.
Mine was USR, 14400, 28800, 33600 then finally 56k. We didn't have money, Dad just ran the IT department
How much did a USR 56k cost back then?
For me? Same as a copy of windows, office, visual basic 3, etc -- £0.00
No idea what the company paid for it
No idea what the company paid for it
$100~ USD
Just until 3Com actually bought USR. A friend of mine helped the USR founder with his taxes from that deal.
The images on this site load very slowly... I very much hope this is because someone at USR deliberately throttled each connection to 56k. Retail performance art is an underexplored niche.
The images are more than 8mb each! Crazy...
There is a twitch streamer (kitboga) who role-plays as an elderly lady. He baits scammers into calling him and messes with them for a few hours.
His setup is quite elaborate. Fake bank accounts, google play store, etc. One of the more subtle parts is a chrome extension he wrote that adds a random delay to the load time for web elements to better simulate an ancient home desktop and poor internet connection.
His setup is quite elaborate. Fake bank accounts, google play store, etc. One of the more subtle parts is a chrome extension he wrote that adds a random delay to the load time for web elements to better simulate an ancient home desktop and poor internet connection.
He's a very proficient developer. He made 95% of internet sites.
I worked in Medicare claims EDI years ago, but still in the modern era. 2008ish? Anyhow, back then at least, ALL claims were required to be submitted via dial up modems. These doctors offices with fiber optics were befuddled, and rightly so. The biggest complaint was that they couldn't even find modems to buy anymore, and USR is where we pointed them to.
Between that and the magic of modem commands, it really felt like everything you learned at that job was useless. Turns out, it was.
No idea if it's still the same way today, but it wouldn't surprise me.
Between that and the magic of modem commands, it really felt like everything you learned at that job was useless. Turns out, it was.
No idea if it's still the same way today, but it wouldn't surprise me.
I used to work for the company that did tech support for McDonald’s. They were still using USR modems to transmit data from restaurants to corp way into the 2010s, like 2015 or 2016!? They sucked to troubleshoot because nobody knew what a modem was anymore, but on the other hand, they were kinda indestructible.
I remember how excited I was when I bought my usr 56k modem. I imaged how awesome it would be to download faster than 3.2k/s!! I plugged that bad boy in, and discovered that due to the phone lines in my area, I could now download at about 3.3k/s.
I worked for a local ISP in the 90’s and can tell you you were not the only one. In my memory 56k modems were rarely reliably better than 33.6ks. Myself I seem to recall feeling luck to get around 40k connections.
I definitely remember redialing multiple times to try to get both a modem from the 56k bank (my ISP had a mix while switching over), and a connection going as fast as possible. I don't remember whether the max speeds I got were, but when downloading a "big" multi-MB file it was worth it to get a faster connection.
same experience, France had decent phone lines for audio, but the bandwidth 56k provided over those lines were rarely stable, falling even below 1kB wasn't uncommon.
Sure you mean 3.3KiloBytes per second. That would be about 30 kilobits per second.
Yes, if a 56k modem was running at full tilt you could get around 5kbytes per second.
Downloading SG1 episodes back in 2000 over a 56k modem was not quite the streaming experience we take for granted today :D
Downloading SG1 episodes back in 2000 over a 56k modem was not quite the streaming experience we take for granted today :D
Lets not forget about V.42bis 4:1 best case compression ratio. V.92 upgraded to 6:1 V.44, but nobody used those anymore.
i'd have to download midi files for music. :-)
I still have a bunch of proper modems in a box (including some USRs). What I've been planning, is to put up a real live dial-up BBS on a spare land-line I have, so that retro-people can actually play with the built-in modems in old machines.
I've done a cursory Google search, and I don't think there are any UK based dial-up-only BBSs still running, so I think it would be a good thing to do.
In a few years time, the whole of the UK will be fully switched over to VoIP on the back-end (invisible to the end-user) for all land-lines, which as I understand it will limit modem speeds to about 2,400 baud due to the VoIP compression. So this might be the last chance for [UK] people to experience dial-up at full speeds.
I've done a cursory Google search, and I don't think there are any UK based dial-up-only BBSs still running, so I think it would be a good thing to do.
In a few years time, the whole of the UK will be fully switched over to VoIP on the back-end (invisible to the end-user) for all land-lines, which as I understand it will limit modem speeds to about 2,400 baud due to the VoIP compression. So this might be the last chance for [UK] people to experience dial-up at full speeds.
Which also means they won't get to hear the full connection "song" as their modem explores all the different coding and error correction options to negotiate the best connection. A full rack of modems connected to a server made our server room into discordant cathedral, sporadic modem sopranos overloaded on the thrum of the big tape drives bursting writes.
It would depend on the codec they choose. You're definitely getting more delay and jitter regardless, but g.711 is commonly available for voip and is essentially the same encoding as on a t-1/e-1, but with packetization delay (a t-1 multiplexes with one sample per line per sample period, in voip you generally send 20 or 40 or something samples per packet)
The OS support says "Windows"
Weren't USR modems famous for being some of the better Linux compatible modems back in the day? (As opposed to cheap crappy "WinModems" that overtook everything)
Weren't USR modems famous for being some of the better Linux compatible modems back in the day? (As opposed to cheap crappy "WinModems" that overtook everything)
All modems were compatible with Linux until very late in the piece, when so-called WinModems appeared commercially IIRC ~1998.[0] In these, processing done in hardware on other modems was offloaded to the CPU via closed source systems. This was probably only possible as CPUs had become faster, and was likely done to save cash and PCB space in Y2K-era laptops. I think they were eventually largely supported under Linux, but basically by this time nobody needed them anymore. The reason modems were all so well supported was that a stable serial interface was largely supported across the board by all vendors. After serial line configuration, only vendor-specific extensions and a slow evolution of additional features such as caller ID differed. Some Aussie examples (ignore the two at right): https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/50/Australi...
[0] Just checked and those dates are ~correct https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Softmodem
[0] Just checked and those dates are ~correct https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Softmodem
> but basically by this time nobody needed them anymore.
Not quite. Broadband was getting significant adoption, but it was more expensive and not available everywhere, so most people stayed on dial-up for years to come. Visitors to this site old enough to recall that era would very likely have been early adopters, so it's easy to have the perspective that dial-up went away circa 2000, when it really didn't, it merely peaked... It wasn't until the 2010s when dial-up disappeared.
But that also discounts travel... Even if you had broadband at home, the world wasn't blanketed with Wi-Fi like it is now. Only the best hotels had ethernet jacks, and cellular data was still very slow and with very high per-minute usage fees. So laptops continued to come with rj11 jacks for years to come.
Not quite. Broadband was getting significant adoption, but it was more expensive and not available everywhere, so most people stayed on dial-up for years to come. Visitors to this site old enough to recall that era would very likely have been early adopters, so it's easy to have the perspective that dial-up went away circa 2000, when it really didn't, it merely peaked... It wasn't until the 2010s when dial-up disappeared.
But that also discounts travel... Even if you had broadband at home, the world wasn't blanketed with Wi-Fi like it is now. Only the best hotels had ethernet jacks, and cellular data was still very slow and with very high per-minute usage fees. So laptops continued to come with rj11 jacks for years to come.
AN OPINIONATED HISTORY OF THE MODEM
~1960s-1980s: critically important for HIGH SPEED LEASED LINE[0] MAINFRAME[1] MINICOMPUTERS[2] IMPs[3] and PADs[4] (~100-300-1200bps).
1980s-early 1990s: Hayes serial modem AT command set released.[H] Modems critically important for BBSs, UUCP, Amiga/PC warez scenes, early open source distribution. (2400bps/9600bps/14.4/28.8/56k)
~early 1990s: critically important for early internet growth which largely supplants BBSs (56k) and coincides with the initial popularity surge for Linux
~1995-2000: broadband grows rapidly in developed countries. It really kicks the llama's ass. Early P2P warez via Gnutella, MP3 and DivX. CD burning is rife. ISO images are a thing. Against this background, Sony's minidisc fails but accidentally enshrines funny Finns rapping as history.[5]
~1998 winmodem! KK System releases Fax U and popularizes negotiation sounds as art.[6]
~1999: Somebody picks up the phone[7] and the modem connection drops.
~2000-2005: potentially viable but declining option vs broadband (Mbps). Even China had >Mbps HFC broadband at this time. DVDs are mainstream. Steam, Valve's revolutionary harbinger of online software distribution for desktops, is released.
~2004: Artists use modems as current subjects.[8]
~2005-2010: poor countries and extreme desperation only. Physical distribution of software wanes.
~2010: 56k becomes slower than mobile data in most places. Many countries cease hauling copper pair due to mobile plus copper thievery. The developing world comes online without legacy copper infrastructure.
~2013: Artists use modems as retro subjects.[9]
~now = Amusing historical tidbit. Slower than mobile data that's 3 generations old.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leased_line [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mainframe_computer [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minicomputer [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interface_Message_Processor [4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Packet_assembler/disassembler [H] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hayes_command_set [5] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ymNFyxvIdaM [6] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MmQSROkTb3c [7] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xphxPPQXJKw [8] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJSQILBGoqk [9] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cfdZUnHkuuI
Phew. A nice Sunday morning dalliance: back to work :)
~1960s-1980s: critically important for HIGH SPEED LEASED LINE[0] MAINFRAME[1] MINICOMPUTERS[2] IMPs[3] and PADs[4] (~100-300-1200bps).
1980s-early 1990s: Hayes serial modem AT command set released.[H] Modems critically important for BBSs, UUCP, Amiga/PC warez scenes, early open source distribution. (2400bps/9600bps/14.4/28.8/56k)
~early 1990s: critically important for early internet growth which largely supplants BBSs (56k) and coincides with the initial popularity surge for Linux
~1995-2000: broadband grows rapidly in developed countries. It really kicks the llama's ass. Early P2P warez via Gnutella, MP3 and DivX. CD burning is rife. ISO images are a thing. Against this background, Sony's minidisc fails but accidentally enshrines funny Finns rapping as history.[5]
~1998 winmodem! KK System releases Fax U and popularizes negotiation sounds as art.[6]
~1999: Somebody picks up the phone[7] and the modem connection drops.
~2000-2005: potentially viable but declining option vs broadband (Mbps). Even China had >Mbps HFC broadband at this time. DVDs are mainstream. Steam, Valve's revolutionary harbinger of online software distribution for desktops, is released.
~2004: Artists use modems as current subjects.[8]
~2005-2010: poor countries and extreme desperation only. Physical distribution of software wanes.
~2010: 56k becomes slower than mobile data in most places. Many countries cease hauling copper pair due to mobile plus copper thievery. The developing world comes online without legacy copper infrastructure.
~2013: Artists use modems as retro subjects.[9]
~now = Amusing historical tidbit. Slower than mobile data that's 3 generations old.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leased_line [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mainframe_computer [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minicomputer [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interface_Message_Processor [4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Packet_assembler/disassembler [H] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hayes_command_set [5] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ymNFyxvIdaM [6] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MmQSROkTb3c [7] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xphxPPQXJKw [8] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJSQILBGoqk [9] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cfdZUnHkuuI
Phew. A nice Sunday morning dalliance: back to work :)
The external serial ones will work with anything, and they say "OS Compatibility: Windows, Linux" but really any OS would see these as just serial devices.
Would the PCI-E one work under Linux? I've got an old 98/XP/Linux machine that would be fun to stick a modem into for the novelty. Unfortunately the PCI slots are all taken up
Just as an aside, even if it turns out to be a Winmodem, many of them can still be used under Linux. Towards the end of the modem era there were a couple of open source efforts to create Linux drivers for popular Winmodem chipsets. LTMODEM was one of them. For reasons I don't understand, most were unable to do 56k/v92bis though.
The other interesting thing about Winmodems/softmodems, is that they could also be used for stuff besides serial data transmission. In particular, you could use them to send/receive faxes and handle voice calls. This latter ability was particularly neat.
No idea if they're still supported, but the Asterisk telephony package could even use inexpensive PCI modems as part of a PBX, to connect to analog devices on either the internal (wired phones) or external (POTS phone line) sides. This is a bit less impressive today, when you can buy a cheap SIP ATA for $20, than it was in the late 90s / early 00s when I first heard about it.
The other interesting thing about Winmodems/softmodems, is that they could also be used for stuff besides serial data transmission. In particular, you could use them to send/receive faxes and handle voice calls. This latter ability was particularly neat.
No idea if they're still supported, but the Asterisk telephony package could even use inexpensive PCI modems as part of a PBX, to connect to analog devices on either the internal (wired phones) or external (POTS phone line) sides. This is a bit less impressive today, when you can buy a cheap SIP ATA for $20, than it was in the late 90s / early 00s when I first heard about it.
All modems could do fax, not just softmodems.
PCI-E for that old of a machine?
Why not use the USB one? https://www.usr.com/products/56k-dialup-modem/usr5637/
Why not use the USB one? https://www.usr.com/products/56k-dialup-modem/usr5637/
The page says they sell both controller-based and winmodems.
But Linux works with some winmodems: http://www.linmodems.org/
But Linux works with some winmodems: http://www.linmodems.org/
They worked fine on Macs. Ran a Mac BBS off of one.
I still have a Psion 5mx with a USR modem connected via a null cable. This thread intrigues me to try connecting via dial-up again and see what/if something works with Psion browser
I miss my Psion series 5. The screen cable between the two halves is bad. The keyboard was amazing for a pocket device.
You used to be able to get replacement cables pretty cheaply, so it could be a fun project to try and resurrect.
To the op, I used a Psion 5 with serial cable as a data center serial terminal for year :)
To the op, I used a Psion 5 with serial cable as a data center serial terminal for year :)
It makes a person of my age feel right at home that they are still using the same case molds for these. I wonder if they still have regular production runs, or they are selling off a monumental back inventory from the 90s.
I love random pieces of history like this. Like when I discovered that StuffIt was only discontinued in 2019. I wonder who was buying it as late as that. https://support1.smithmicro.com/portal/en/kb/articles/stuffi...
My favourite is the old Printronix line printer:
https://printronix.com/product/line-matrix-en/p8000-open-ped...
I started my career writing label printing software for these in 1982. They have barely changed since.
https://printronix.com/product/line-matrix-en/p8000-open-ped...
I started my career writing label printing software for these in 1982. They have barely changed since.
Even usr manufactured those terrible winmmodens: https://www.usr.com/products/56k-dialup-modem/usr5638/ ?
Reputation scratched.
Reputation scratched.
I remember the dubstep it used to play to connect to the Internet. Good times
I kind of assume everyone on the internet already saw this, but in case you're one of today's lucky ten thousand:
http://www.windytan.com/2012/11/the-sound-of-dialup-pictured...
http://www.windytan.com/2012/11/the-sound-of-dialup-pictured...
I worked Mac tech support for a regional ISP in Northern California when the 56k modems were announced. It was a time of rapid development in modem technology. When my boss told me of the new modem it sounded impossibly fast - most of our customers at the time were still on 14.4 or 28.8. He then told me that 56k would probably never catch on while pointing at the large point to point radio antennas he wanted to mount on everyone’s homes…
Years ago, I used a Linux script from the vendor to upgrade my us robotics "56k message modem" from V90 to V92.
The result was a brick. Lifetime warranty or not, the vendor did not honor warranty. Thus I do recommend getting your modem elsewhere. By now, I'd expect OSHW solutions to be available.
Should anybody know how to possibly get past the brick, please let me know. A cursory glance inside years ago didn't yield anything that looked like a PROM.
The result was a brick. Lifetime warranty or not, the vendor did not honor warranty. Thus I do recommend getting your modem elsewhere. By now, I'd expect OSHW solutions to be available.
Should anybody know how to possibly get past the brick, please let me know. A cursory glance inside years ago didn't yield anything that looked like a PROM.
Good news, it’s the year 2021 and computers are so fast that you could probably bit bang a 56k modem connection using a python script on a raspberry pi
DSP on the cpu would definitely suffice today (albeit undersirable). But it would still need some analog hardware to interface the phone line.
Ultimately, I'd like the old device I liked to watch the leds blink on to be back alive again, preferably without replacing the whole PCB.
Ultimately, I'd like the old device I liked to watch the leds blink on to be back alive again, preferably without replacing the whole PCB.
[deleted]
I can't find any scans of the external modem PCBs, but the internal ISA ones have a 28f or 29f series EEPROM from what I've seen. Often there's a sticker on them with firmware info, which suggests they're programmed before being soldered on the board (ie: no JTAG).
The internal ones shouldn't be much different than externals, they just implement another serial interface.
Would be a pain to desolder and resolder if it's a TSOP chip, but PLCC isn't too bad. You might have some better luck if you high-jack a compatible motherboard's floppy-disk BIOS update process to write a new binary.
56ks are not very expensive to buy off ebay.
The internal ones shouldn't be much different than externals, they just implement another serial interface.
Would be a pain to desolder and resolder if it's a TSOP chip, but PLCC isn't too bad. You might have some better luck if you high-jack a compatible motherboard's floppy-disk BIOS update process to write a new binary.
56ks are not very expensive to buy off ebay.
I'll have to look at it again at some point. I last did over 10yr ago.
If it was a 28f or 29f I failed to locate, I'd be able to very easily write to it; I also can solder/desolder these days.
The next problem would of course be to locate the actual firmware to burn.
If it was a 28f or 29f I failed to locate, I'd be able to very easily write to it; I also can solder/desolder these days.
The next problem would of course be to locate the actual firmware to burn.
Just buy another that has been upgraded and dump its firmware
I did some firmware hack to make a 28.8 or 33.6 Sportster a 56k one. I think there was a window where they used the same hardware, but throttled it down in firmware so they could charge more.
What an animal! I logged onto our BBS with a 300 baud, and could watch the characters appear on the green CRT one at a time. Such speed, such exhilaration.
If you picked up the phone while using 300 baud, you could make out individual keypresses.
My dad's modem was 75 baud, on the TRS80. You didn't plug a phone line directly into it. This was still in the era of rotary phones before push button blue tone ones. You put the handset of the phone (which had the microphone and speaker) into a cradle. It looked like this[1].
[1] https://opengear.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/acousticcoup...
Coincidentally, in the picture, that big box that is as big as an early desktop PC that the modem is sitting on, is a whopping 5 megabyte hard drive. State of the art for consumer hard drives at the time. I still have my dads in the garage. I vividly remember having to type "park" to park the hard drive heads before you turned it off, or it could corrupt everything on the drive when you turned it back on and the heads went back to the MBR.
[1] https://opengear.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/acousticcoup...
Coincidentally, in the picture, that big box that is as big as an early desktop PC that the modem is sitting on, is a whopping 5 megabyte hard drive. State of the art for consumer hard drives at the time. I still have my dads in the garage. I vividly remember having to type "park" to park the hard drive heads before you turned it off, or it could corrupt everything on the drive when you turned it back on and the heads went back to the MBR.
Mine, like the most of them was not even an autodial-modem one! Endless "fun" trying to connect using a rotary-dial phone.
I still have the Apple USB modem, they made it until 2009 or so. Doesn't work on modern Macs anymore but tried last year on Windows 10 and Debian and worked like a charm
https://web.archive.org/web/20090121071149/http://store.appl...
https://web.archive.org/web/20090121071149/http://store.appl...
Ah memories.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gsNaR6FRuO0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqiwRZtSa4I
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_jnc5qYfleA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gsNaR6FRuO0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqiwRZtSa4I
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_jnc5qYfleA
One of the best breakdowns of those sounds i’ve ever seen
http://www.windytan.com/2012/11/the-sound-of-dialup-pictured...
http://www.windytan.com/2012/11/the-sound-of-dialup-pictured...
"One of" ... I love this site :)
I always wondered if the 'business' Courier modems really needed to be so big, or if it just made them look worth the price.
https://www.usr.com/products/56k-dialup-modem/usr3453c/
https://www.usr.com/products/56k-dialup-modem/usr3453c/
The price reflected that they could also talk to mainframes, which didn't use an async bit stream. Couriers could support synchronous communications, and programs like CLEO could use that to support bisync and SNA protocols using the EBCDIC character set.
Instead of start bit, stop bit, and parity, it would use a few SYN bytes (00110010) to get the other side's clock in sync, and then send bytes back-to-back with no start or stop bits, then a checksum at the end of the block.
Back in the day, you had to talk bisync to sell goods at Walmart, for example. They just had a mainframe with Sterling Software's SUPERTRACS mailbox program, and a bank of 9600 baud synchronous modems. Basically in the 90s you had to learn some really arcane shit just to sell your whats-its there.
Instead of start bit, stop bit, and parity, it would use a few SYN bytes (00110010) to get the other side's clock in sync, and then send bytes back-to-back with no start or stop bits, then a checksum at the end of the block.
Back in the day, you had to talk bisync to sell goods at Walmart, for example. They just had a mainframe with Sterling Software's SUPERTRACS mailbox program, and a bank of 9600 baud synchronous modems. Basically in the 90s you had to learn some really arcane shit just to sell your whats-its there.
Thanks!
Interesting: https://www.usr.com/do-not-sell-my-personal-information/
> Please be advised that USR does not, and has not sold any personal information in the last 12 (twelve) months. Similarly, USR does not have any future plans to sell personal information. Please refer to our Privacy Notice for details on how your information is used.
> USR respects and understands that you may still want to ensure your personal information is not sold. Therefore, if you would still like to proceed with your “do not sell my information” request, we ask that you kindly provide the following information:
Yeah I'm not putting in my name and address.
> Please be advised that USR does not, and has not sold any personal information in the last 12 (twelve) months. Similarly, USR does not have any future plans to sell personal information. Please refer to our Privacy Notice for details on how your information is used.
> USR respects and understands that you may still want to ensure your personal information is not sold. Therefore, if you would still like to proceed with your “do not sell my information” request, we ask that you kindly provide the following information:
Yeah I'm not putting in my name and address.
This is just how the CCPA works. If you want to tell them to avoid selling your personal information in the future, you have to identify yourself so they know whose information to not sell.
I almost want to buy one and get a landline just for the nostalgia of it. I’m sure there are still some dial-up BBSes out there.
A couple years ago I came across a post about someone who runs a packet radio BBS in San Francisco: https://www.reddit.com/r/amateurradio/comments/cuxso3/packet... I connected to it over VHF a few times and chatted with the operator once. That was fun.
A couple years ago I came across a post about someone who runs a packet radio BBS in San Francisco: https://www.reddit.com/r/amateurradio/comments/cuxso3/packet... I connected to it over VHF a few times and chatted with the operator once. That was fun.
I wonder if the phone lines are still compatible with data modems nowadays, or if they're all Voice over IP.
If they're Voice (and other noises) over IP, then the modem would be encoding IP packets to tones, and as soon as it reaches the phone provider's hardware the tones will be digitized to be transmitted over IP packets again...
If they're Voice (and other noises) over IP, then the modem would be encoding IP packets to tones, and as soon as it reaches the phone provider's hardware the tones will be digitized to be transmitted over IP packets again...
It's mostly this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G.711 nowadays.
Real POTS(landline) or ISDN is exceedingly rare.
There are some other standards, but they have to be supported on both sides of the line, which is not a given, especially not between different TELCOs/ISPs.
Which makes trying to use FAX over it really 'interesting'.
See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T.38
Technically one should be able to run something like V92/Flex over it, when the stars are aligned right. But nobody does that anymore, because why?
Real POTS(landline) or ISDN is exceedingly rare.
There are some other standards, but they have to be supported on both sides of the line, which is not a given, especially not between different TELCOs/ISPs.
Which makes trying to use FAX over it really 'interesting'.
See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T.38
Technically one should be able to run something like V92/Flex over it, when the stars are aligned right. But nobody does that anymore, because why?
When we moved into a newer subdivision just before 2000 we discovered our modems couldn’t get over about 19.2 (IIRC). We did a lot of troubleshooting but in the end found the culprit was how the phone lines were setup in the complex.
I think the lines were basically like VOIP from the box at the street (or somewhere nearby). They did it to pack more lines in, but it limited the bandwidth available.
You had to pony up for an ISDN line if you wanted to go faster until cable internet was available a few years later.
I think the lines were basically like VOIP from the box at the street (or somewhere nearby). They did it to pack more lines in, but it limited the bandwidth available.
You had to pony up for an ISDN line if you wanted to go faster until cable internet was available a few years later.
I've actually made the dial-up sound my default ringtone.
(Not the number-dialing part though)
The handshake is such a unique sound (and high-pitched too) that it cuts through all environment noises and can't be confused for anything else.
(Not the number-dialing part though)
The handshake is such a unique sound (and high-pitched too) that it cuts through all environment noises and can't be confused for anything else.
haha that's pretty cool! I love custom ringtones. My current ringtone is the Pornhub intro.
stay classy
Vice recently made a series called "The Dark Side of the 90's." The title theme has a 90's rap sound, but at one point, a dialup modem cuts in. It's even pitch and tempo matched.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_X1F4VEUXks
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_X1F4VEUXks
I didn't watch this but your description gives me hope that someone, somewhere has noted how dot matrix printers made for great audio samples. Public Enemy comes to mind.
AT&T still gives out USR 56k modems for management on their fiber lines
offtopic but are there any software modern library that allows you to transfter 56kbps data over any 8khz audio?
>PCIe
>56k
Never occurred to me that I’d see those two terms together.
>56k
Never occurred to me that I’d see those two terms together.
PCIe 1.0 was 2003-ish [1] (I don't recall when the first motherboards actually shipped with them). Even in 2006, AOL had millions of dial up customers, particularly in rural areas without serious broadband options. Eventually they raised the prices on dial up to push anyone that they could to switch to their mediocre DSL service [2].
I recall a lot of even casual internet users finally accepting around that time that they should just transfer their email from AOL (to GMail if they knew someone to get an invite!) and get faster, cheaper "real internet".
But for a time, new PCs from folks like Gateway and so on had an option for PCIe modems, IIRC!
[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/PCI_Express
[2] https://www.cnet.com/news/aol-hanging-up-on-dial-up-customer...
I recall a lot of even casual internet users finally accepting around that time that they should just transfer their email from AOL (to GMail if they knew someone to get an invite!) and get faster, cheaper "real internet".
But for a time, new PCs from folks like Gateway and so on had an option for PCIe modems, IIRC!
[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/PCI_Express
[2] https://www.cnet.com/news/aol-hanging-up-on-dial-up-customer...
A lot of modern desktop computing (64-bit x86, SATA, PCIe, Wifi, death of Windows 9x, multicore CPUs) landed around the same time, and yes, dialup wasn't quite dead yet.
In a lot of ways, desktop computing hasn't changed much in the last 15 years. It changed way more between 1991 and 2006 than 2006 and 2021. Phones and tablets, now those are completely different.
In a lot of ways, desktop computing hasn't changed much in the last 15 years. It changed way more between 1991 and 2006 than 2006 and 2021. Phones and tablets, now those are completely different.
Be this as it may, the neatest modem ever made is the Novation Apple-CAT II:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novation_CAT#The_Apple-CAT_II
https://web.archive.org/web/20190115080818/http://www.jammed...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novation_CAT#The_Apple-CAT_II
https://web.archive.org/web/20190115080818/http://www.jammed...
The coveted king modem for me was the external version with an on/off switch (having started on an internal card). When I finally got one was super happy. Now it’s funny that you can still see these awesome USR 56kx2s kicking around for out of band management in IDFs, gathering dust, sometimes hanging by a cat3 but how totally awesome they were to me all those years ago. Now I don’t even have a phone line to use one if I wanted to.
> The PCIe low profile modem is ideal for a POS system.
Relevant: https://support.usr.com/education/modem-point-of-sale.asp
Relevant: https://support.usr.com/education/modem-point-of-sale.asp
Those are some remarkably tenuous justifications for why the product is desirable.
I'm curious what year their statistics came from for "In North America alone there are 28 billion dialup transactions, which make up over 60% of all the transactions". The oldest Wayback snapshot of that page is from 2014, and while it's surely gone down since then I still run into them from time to time especially in rural areas or those little standalone ATMs in places that don't otherwise have POS.
They might still be installed in lots of those places even if a faster connection is usually used. I've experienced that even within the last year at a gas station when their satellite connection went down and there was a big line due to every card transaction taking 40+ seconds.
They might still be installed in lots of those places even if a faster connection is usually used. I've experienced that even within the last year at a gas station when their satellite connection went down and there was a big line due to every card transaction taking 40+ seconds.
I used to work in a store with a credit card terminal that normally used the internet but was hooked up to a phone line as a backup. When the internet went out the line would back up because the dialing process was so slow, but at least we were still in business. Seems like this is probably still a reasonable backup measure for retailers to have in place, if you already have a phone line it doesn't cost you much.
I particularly appreciated the "Why use dialup" section...
Looks like Hayes modems are still around too, though maybe someone simply forgot to take the webpage down in 1999.
http://www.hayesmicro.com/
http://www.hayesmicro.com/
These are still used in mission critical environments where someone with a Wyse Terminal sits on one end (or at least a terminal emulator) and calls systems in places like a cable company's head end. It's definitely antiquated but, in many cases, old school tech works fine, so penny-pinching folks choose not to upgrade.
I had a hayes 2400baud and a hayes 9600 baud. Once speeds got up to 14.4k , Hayes kind of disappeared.
The 'type +++ath0 to speed up your download' jokes still exist.
as long as it isn't a Win Modem, I'll take it... because Linux.
I've an USR courier gathering dust as I no longer have a voice capable phone line. Fond memories of my modem screeching away down the line.
I've got two if these in boxes (as spares) but the rack in my basement no longer has a POTS phone line available. Is anyone interested?
Unprecedented status symbol in Bosnia at the end of 90's and being of 00's. Must have for people with with low quality phone line.
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I also remember the x2 56k technology where the modem could support two phone lines simultaneously. I wanted one so badly.
x2 and KFlex were both pre-standard single like 56k modulations; v.90 was the resulting standard and most x2 or KFlex modems could be upgraded to that.
Bonding two modems (or a modem with internal bonding) should have a different name to avoid confusion. But maybe didn't.
Bonding two modems (or a modem with internal bonding) should have a different name to avoid confusion. But maybe didn't.
So I burned a pirated ROM to upgrade my USR HST to a USR Dual Standard. I paid $750 for that modem.
Damn kids and their 1gb Ethernet…
Damn kids and their 1gb Ethernet…
I'd love to see the core chip(s) of a "modern" external/serial Courier 56K decapped and photographed.
Can you hear it? The handshake? It's like a sound from childhood.
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Every employer I've ever had has at least one of these deployed.
If only FB had these to a console server in their data centers…
Using a modem for access to OOBM is always a cheap safety net.
Using a modem for access to OOBM is always a cheap safety net.
I'm incredibly surprised they don't. We do, precisely for that reason. Any cloud needs SHTF contingencies, you can't get cocky.
Wait until you see my US Robotics Palm Pilot.
ring, .....
ring, .....
^^^^^^^khhhhhh _______khhhhhhhhh ^^^^^^khhhhhh, pew ... pew ... pew ... kaaaaaaaaaaa haaaaaaaa khhhhh khhhhh tht
Yes!
^^^^^^^khhhhhh _______khhhhhhhhh ^^^^^^khhhhhh, pew ... pew ... pew ... kaaaaaaaaaaa haaaaaaaa khhhhh khhhhh tht
Yes!
any ideas for projects "simple is good" repurposing some old modems?
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ZMODEM
Later BiModem and especially HS/Link built on top of that:
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BiModem
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HS/Link
Being able to download and upload files at the same time really helped make things more time efficient. From downloading files from BBS door games (e.g., Trade Wars 2002):
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BBS_door
To one's mail and forum postings via QWK (and SOUP for offline Usenet reading):
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QWK_(file_format)