• Please review our updated Terms and Rules here

Do people collect modems?

Need a system to call? Try The US/Canada Dialup-Up BBS Guide. With so many carriers offering free long distance at least part of the day/week, it's not out of the question to spend a little time dialing across the country anymore.

You can also dial public access UNIX systems...SDF being the most popular I'm aware of. For now, you can also reach GREX by modem as well.
 
Anonymous Freak said:
I think he's referring specifically to people who now only have high-speed internet accounts, with no dial-up account to use. I, for one, have no account that allows me to dial in anywhere for any kind of access. (Sadly, dial-up inbound won't work over my VOIP, not even 1200 baud will connect reliably.)
Click to expand...

Yep, specifically referring to myself and everyone I know.. I don't even have phone service (<3 Ooma).

Anonymous Freak said:
I think here he specifically means using a modem and a phone line emulator to connect two systems internally, with the second also having a network card; thereby bridging the two connection types. I don't think he literally means plugging Ethernet into a phone jack.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I mean using an AT machine with a modem and a NIC hooked up to the network to emulate a server for the older machine with only a modem to dial into.

MikeS said:
Yes, if you don't have a POTS line then a POTS modem is not very useful for accessing the Internet.
DSL modems are also equally useless for the same reason.
Cable modems are also useless (if I'm referring to people without Cable).
Wireless modems are of course also useless (if I'm referring to people without an accessible access point).

But whether you believe it or not, and whether your ISP allows it (I have access to four different ones who all allow it), there are still people out there (me included) who still use dial-up modems.
Of course; just connecting the two serial ports together is much too simple and not nearly as much fun as installing a pair of modems, making/building a line simulator, configuring answer/originate etc. just to talk to another computer or bridge...
Click to expand...

Chill out man, I wasn't attacking dial-up users - I know you still exist.. :p

Personally I haven't seen dial-up for 10 years though, and have not even once set it up myself.. it's a dead technology where I live (FiOS can be had for $15/mo, and dial-up for $10/mo.. which would you choose?)..

As for connecting the serial ports, that is fine if you only have two machines, but let's say you have six XTs and a Commodore 64 w/ a VICMODEM - with a single modem/NIC combo server (after adding more modems) you can serve all of these machines at once. For someone like me who has piles of phone cables and two dozen or more modems, this is the cheap and easy way, since I have like.. two serial cables total.
 
Raven said:
Yep, specifically referring to myself and everyone I know.. I don't even have phone service (<3 Ooma).
Click to expand...
I just like to remind you that many of your sweeping general statements and opinions are indeed only based on and relevant to your own often rather limited experience; the latest statistics say that approximately 10 million Americans still access the internet via dial-up, not to mention BBS's (this is vintage-computer.com after all). BTW, I'd say the XT you're plugging it into is as much 'dead technology' as the modem.

Yeah, I mean using an AT machine with a modem and a NIC hooked up to the network to emulate a server for the older machine with only a modem to dial into.
Click to expand...
Yeah, if you really don't have a null-modem cable in your vast collection of stuff then yes, using two modems instead of just connecting the XT's serial port to the AT's serial port makes sense I guess; still, most people would probably do it the easy (and probably faster) way...
Chill out man, I wasn't attacking dial-up users - I know you still exist.. :p
Click to expand...
Didn't think you were attacking dial-up users, just maybe not aware that many millions of people have a different perspective from yours.

Personally I haven't seen dial-up for 10 years though, and have not even once set it up myself.. it's a dead technology where I live (FiOS can be had for $15/mo, and dial-up for $10/mo.. which would you choose?)..
Click to expand...
I choose one of four ISPs that are all free of charge, and a free wireless access point when I need one.

As for connecting the serial ports, that is fine if you only have two machines, but let's say you have six XTs and a Commodore 64 w/ a VICMODEM - with a single modem/NIC combo server (after adding more modems) you can serve all of these machines at once. For someone like me who has piles of phone cables and two dozen or more modems, this is the cheap and easy way, since I have like.. two serial cables total.
Click to expand...
Since a modem is or uses a serial port, I don't quite see how you can serve a dozen or more machines "all at once" using modems any more than using serial ports unless you're using a hub (either way)?
 
No one uses POTS modems any more? Seems that NetZero is still going strong in a lot of areas. If you look at any reasonably recent version of Opera, you'll find that it has a "turbo" mode for people using dialup.

Get much outside of urban areas in the US, and dialup is sometimes only one of two choices--the other being satellite (uplink speeds are still done with POTS). What's laughingly called "broadband" in the US is usually slower than most other industrialized countries, more expensive and less ubiquitous.
 
Yeah I know our broadband is pretty pathetic, but it is fairly widespread here on the east coast.

People do use POTS connections, but not anywhere near where I live, and generally here on the east coast, it's 99% broadband.

Since a modem is or uses a serial port, I don't quite see how you can serve a dozen or more machines "all at once" using modems any more than using serial ports unless you're using a hub (either way)?
Click to expand...

If you notice, I also said to add more modems.. I have one null modem cable, but maybe 20 modems available - it's just more plentiful for me.

I choose one of four ISPs that are all free of charge, and a free wireless access point when I need one.
Click to expand...

Free? I'd use dial-up with some old boxes just for fun if it was free here... but then I'd have to pay a telephone bill too...

Didn't mean to seem ignorant, or angry, or whatever I came off as - had an untactful moment it seems, so sorry.
 
I'd say that far less than 99% of the east coast uses high-speed Internet...there are a /lot/ of rural areas that don't have (and probably never will) broadband coverage. Satellite and dialup are the only options out where my family lives...but satellite is now done with a two-way radio link. The lag is pretty significant, especially with SSL connections, but it's better than dialup overall.

There are plenty of free dialup services... freedialup.org comes to mind for actual TCP/IP Internet. If you want to call them inexpensively, get a prepaid phone card (or use one of the ad-based services that give you phone minutes). I wrote a script a long time ago to allow connections through a phone card with minicom under Linux, for use when traveling. Many of my relatives, as well as my girlfriend's relatives, don't have Internet and live far enough out that finding an access point is a no-go. So, we dial in to GREX to send e-mails when away.

Getting two modems to talk to one another in-house is neat, but not really practical for data transfer if you're going to be transferring often. Null modem cables are really simple to build, doubly so if you use DB-9/25 -> RJ45 converters. The "null modem" cable is just a patch cable configured as a "rollover" cable (so called because the ordering of the pins is reversed between ends). If you don't want to mess with custom cables, you can get "modem" and "terminal" converters, which swap the necessary wires for you and let you use straight-through Cat5 between the converters. I use them for most of my serial links, especially to remote terminals. The converters are pretty cheap, too.
 
Yeah I do have one null modem converter too, but I don't have any (known/tested) plain serial cables, heh - I have one db25 that I'm not certain what it is (or if it matters) and one db9 that I'm not sure what it is. I will mess with that next time I do transfers of that sort.
 
Last edited:
Anybody try one of the free dialup ISPs like netzero? I might join just for the heck of it to have an ISP for my old laptops with built in modems.
 
Unknown_K: Anybody try one of the free dialup ISPs like netzero? I might join just for the heck of it to have an ISP for my old laptops with built in modems.
Click to expand...

I didn't know there were any free ones. That's really interesting. I'll have to try it.

I discovered that, although I have broadband, I can dial into my ISP using the the same account. Apparently they don't differentiate at their end. I suspect it would be the same in most places. There are probably very few ISPs that don't offer dialup. Apart from being a way to test stuff, it has been handy a couple of times when the wireless broadband has gone down.

Chuck(G): One way to handle this is to buy a bunch of "straight" cables and make your own adapters and gender changers.
Click to expand...

Recently I needed a null modem cable and it's impossible to buy anything like that around here. I just cut a straight through cable and soldered the wires together in the "right" order. Some bits of shrink wrap, and a big piece of wrap for the whole joint, and it looks just fine. This is a much easier way than dealing with attaching cable to connectors. My bag of miscellaneous adaptors takes care of whatever is required at the ends.
 
Somewhere I have a Hayes Pocket Modem that is powered directly by the serial port, with no external "wall wart" power supply needed. Unfortunately it's only 2400 baud, and CompuServe cancelled their "Classic" service last year, so I have no dialup access anymore.
 
vwestlife said:
Somewhere I have a Hayes Pocket Modem that is powered directly by the serial port, with no external "wall wart" power supply needed. Unfortunately it's only 2400 baud, and CompuServe cancelled their "Classic" service last year, so I have no dialup access anymore.
Click to expand...
I have a tiny one like that. It's also 2400 baud but made by Practical Peripherals.

It's unfortunate that Pontus' modems are in that in-between area that isn't very interesting at this point in time. They could be handy enough for really old gear though. After all an 8250 UART maxes out at 19200 baud anyway. Being external is a particular advantage too. The bottom line is that they'll be quite antique and hard to replace in just a few years.
 
Unknown_K said:
Anybody try one of the free dialup ISPs like netzero? I might join just for the heck of it to have an ISP for my old laptops with built in modems.
Click to expand...
I use netzero from time to time; you have to put up with some ads, but they do have an impressive list of local dialling numbers.

Many cities also have local Freenet sites, but they're not always free and, if they are, often limit access time pretty severely.

Most ISPs around here that I'm aware of have dial-up access as well as broadband; as glitch points out a modem is still pretty useful for retrieving email or browsing if you're visiting relatives or on vacation someplace without broadband access of some kind.
 
Last edited:
Ole Juul said:
It's unfortunate that Pontus' modems are in that in-between area that isn't very interesting at this point in time. They could be handy enough for really old gear though. After all an 8250 UART maxes out at 19200 baud anyway. Being external is a particular advantage too. The bottom line is that they'll be quite antique and hard to replace in just a few years.
Click to expand...
True enough; unfortunately the old <19200bd modems aren't really very useful for anything other than reliving the 300bd BBS experience...
 
vwestlife said:
Somewhere I have a Hayes Pocket Modem that is powered directly by the serial port, with no external "wall wart" power supply needed. Unfortunately it's only 2400 baud, and CompuServe cancelled their "Classic" service last year, so I have no dialup access anymore.
Click to expand...

I have one of these, too. Great little device. Now I want to hunt around and see if there are any 'server emulators' for some of the old fashioned dial-up systems like the old AOL, Prodigy, the old CompuServe, etc. (I know there is an effort to re-make Apple's eWorld, I'd love to see The Sierra Network / ImagiNation Network get revived as well.)

Edit: Holy carp! INN has been reverse-engineer-revived: http://sites.google.com/site/innrevival/home
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top