How to tell a hardware modem?

[FunkyT]

Morning!

I'm interested in the following modem (no broadband available):

http://tinyurl.com/porx
http://tinyurl.com/pory

How can I tell if it's 100% hardware or not?

Thanks

Rich

[Howard]

They won't be Winmodems. They're not around much anymore.
They're from a reputable manufacturer those two, so they'll be decent.

[Austin]

There are a few other ways to tell but rather usefully I've forgotten them! Sw modems tend to be smaller and have MUCH bigger Minimum Requirements (eg P400 vs any Pentium). In fact a true hw modem should be happy in a 486 IIRC as the CPU has very little work to do at all.

[FunkyT]

Thanks for the info! Now I need to find out if the modem I'm interested in is a "true" hardware one or not

[directhex]

Softmodem tbh

1) "U.S. Robotics 56K Faxmodem PCI for Windows" i.e. Windows Only

2) Much as the pics are tiny, they're non-recyangular boards which don't have ROOM for both a DSP and a controller.

It'll be HCF (half hardware half software) at best.

the only way to garuntee hardware these days is with a Serial Port modem

--jo

[FunkyT]

Thanks very much for the useful advice - much appreciated!

[Stoo]

yup, most pci modems are either winmodems or HCF jobbies these days, I think even my last supra56k was HCF

[jon bda]

Ebuyer do hardware PCI modems for about a fiver or so...had to put one in a neighbours P133...

[SilentDeath]

intel HaM modem from pc world is very good (but Hardaware accelerated Modem!), gets very good pings and doesnt require many, if any cpu cycles, oh it also have drivers for linux etc..

[FunkyT]

Thanks very much for all of your helpful replies!

[Stoo]

IIRC the Intel chipset is also rebadged under the "Ambient" brand.

[SilentDeath]

intel took over ambient, which took over connexaint