V. 90 ISA 56k modem vs. V.92 PCI 56k modem.

[A31Chris]

What would be the advantage of having the V.92 PCI 56k over the ISA V.90 56k? This is taking into account both of them are hardware based and are not Winmodems.

I'm sorry about posting so much lately. Its just that I have questions.

[Welshjim]

A31Chris--Sorry I cannot comment on the difference between a PCI and an ISA modem, but one of the first things to determine is whether your ISP will support v.92. If not you cannot get the benefits of v.92.

[J A L]

Hello,

First off Isa hardware based modems can be run without any cpu resousrces whatsoever. The US Robotics Courier Isa modem is just such a modem. It can run on a 386 all day long without problems. The pages may take a while to display due to all the graphics and limitted ram 386 computers have to run the browsers....etc but that is a different subject!

With PCI Modems they all will use a slight amount of CPU resources if they are hardware based and even more if they are soft modems. Now there are two different types of soft modems out there ones with dsp (digital signal processor) and ones without. US Robotics PCI anything modems Seem harder to configure and almost never just plug and play. Seems I am always having to juggle resources to make them happy or switching PCI slots... I don't like em. The Win modem was especially bad, horrible, the worst ever!

For soft modems I like Lucent based ones and for hardware based 0 resource using modems I only like Serial Port Courier Modems. You can get those $300.00 v.90 ones off of ebay for $40.00 or less. Used V.92 ones for $50.00 or so. A used Courier is better than any New Modem I have ever used! Bar None!!

As for V.92 Modems it is as far as i know backwards compatible to the V.90 standard. Here is a link to V.92 and why you should be running it! Link

If your getting A new modem at least get a V.92 and most serial port ones are resource users! Usb just like PCI will use CPU resources!

[cleaverb]

Someone should mention that the PCI modems may have
some 'minimum requirements' to run their modem. Several
will work on a pentium1 . However, before purchasing any
new hardware, make certain that the computer you want to
install it in meets/exceeds the 'minimum requirements'.
If it says right on the box that it needs a pentiumII processor
at 266mhz and 32MB of RAM, you should not install that
into anything less. Personally I would not install such a modem
into a 266, because , even though it says it will work, it would
probably not perform so well. It would be okay in a pentium3,
as far as I am concerned.

[A31Chris]

Thanks for the input. I recently bought an Intel V.92 PCI hardware based modem brand new off ebay for pretty cheap. It says its a PCI/Data/Fax/Speakerphone modem. It has no minimum CPU requirements listed anywhere that I can find. It does however, say it will run on Windows 95.

I bought it at a spur of the moment when I thought my US Robotics modem had conked out.

Chris