Getting the most out of your USR Sportster in Debian

Larry asks: "I've got a USR Sportster 56K INT modem, jumpered to be COM2. Under Windows it gets 50,667cps, but only 31-33,600cps when I'm using Debian. What is the correct script to achieve faster downloads in Linux? The default script is 'ATZ'" Ah, the days of the AT command set...however I've never seen a modem with well configured factory defaults. Any suggestions?

Different USR question: stopages

[drwiii]

My sportster 56k v.90 modem does the exact same thing.. The rightmost light will go out for about 10 seconds, and then it'll come back on and everything will flood through.

I doubt it could be "line noise", I've tried it sitting about 10 feet away from our dialup server on an internal line and it does the exact same thing.

USR init strings

[gavinhall]

Posted by painmerchant:

There's a few init strings that are out there for the Sportsters, although I'm not sure if they need to be different for Linux than other platforms (excuse my ignorance here, I'm still learning). The main one is to set the floor and ceiling connects for the modem, and the string is AT&N14&U31 - you can fiddle with either numbers till it hooks up the way you want it to. The N is the floor and the U the ceiling, and I think those numbers are equivalent to 14=28.8 and 31=57.333... Hope that helps.

Different USR question: stopages

[bluGill]

I've got a USR courier, upgraded to 56k. Lately I've been seen a lot of delays. for instatance a ping might return like this:
ping -i 5 ip
ip 64 bytes, 100.56ms (good)
ip 64 bytes, 30062.23ms
ip 64 bytes, 25071.43ms
ip 64 bytes, 20096.57ms
ip 64 bytes, 15101.48ms
ip 64 bytes, 10128.83ms
5131.43ms
ip 64 bytes, 131ms

Of course those numbers are made up, but they are typical, pinging my ISP's mail server (which should be a local subnet) or any other internet service. What is interesting is nothing at all gets through for 20 seconds, and then it all comes in one lump, and then nothing, with no data loss. This suggestes to me that it is a possibal modem problem, and while the modem trys to recover from some noise things back up. Except that 20 seconds is a long time.

I live in an area where noisy phone lines are a way of life (I see a lot of ppp rx errors), and I'm wondering if such delays are normal for bad phone lines, or if I should go through the effort of changing ISPs? Has anyone else seen this and traced it down?

Where to find USR manuals

[robin]

They're at ae.pcd.usr.com [usr.com]. Does anyone have any USR speakerphone stuff working on Alpha Linux, by the way? It seems like it should be straightforward (in tcl/tk, for example), but I can't see anything on the net.

--
W.A.S.T.E.

Sounds like...

[squarooticus]

...you've got the serial port set to a slower baud rate. Set the bps to 57.6k or 115.2k (spd_hi or spd_vhi) with setserial.
--
Kyle R. Rose, MIT LCS

What manual ...

[LizardKing]

Since 3Com bought USR, they've stopped shipping manuals with their modems. Now you just get the irritating 'Insert the driver disk and type A:\SETUP.EXE' instructions.

Limiting your connect speed

[cazmo]

In my /etc/wvdial.conf I have the init string of AT&U26&N30

U26 = Low connect speed of 33.6
N30 = High connect speed of 45333 - will always connect at that speed. (unless phone line/isp or other condition's are noisy/poor)

Sometimes I up it to N32 which is a nice 48000 connect speed, but my phone lines sometimes can't handle it.

This init string works great for the usr V.90 users we have on our system. If they have problems connecting we give em this string and 99% of em connect just fine.

Here's what you really need to do

[burner]

You are correct, You need to get ahold of the command set for your modem (I think USR does have this online). If not, one of the dialers (wvdial) with debian will do a very nice autoconfigure of the modem, then you can use that string with pppconfig or whatever. (Note that I'm speaking from experience, I got a Jaton X2/v.90 card this summer, but I don't remember if I just DL'd the command set from somewhere or used wvdial). You might also be able to grab the best init string from the .inf file for your modem in Windows. That should do it.

The easy way...

[danci]

If you still have Wintendo installed, you can log all the commands sent to the modem while connecting (somewhere around modem configuration - advanced button). This way, you will see exactly what init string wintendo uses to setup modem.

Actually, I had a modem with manuals once, but Wintendo was using some undocumented AT commands (well, at least they were not listed in my copy of the manuals) that were essential for modem to work OK.

D.

i don't think so

[Wonko]

internal modems _do_ use the computers' uarts. if you've ever written a low-level serial driver you'll know this. communication with an internal modem occurs at the speed set on the uart. Most modern computers (anything >= pentium class) have 16550 or better uarts capable of 115200 bps (a uart is really just a fifo).

Actually, the uart is going to be on the modem card. If you put an old 2400 in your pentium, you'll notice it's either got an 8250 or 16450 on it. Put your 56k in a 286(or 8088 if you can find an 8 bit 56k card I guess :p), and you'll have a 16550.

ummm.. no!

[SoftwareJanitor]

you would use pppd to set this not setserial.

Actually, what I do is use setserial in my rc.local to set the 38400 speed (spd_vhi) on the UART to be 115K, then use pppd to select 38400, which really then gives me 115K. I dunno if this is the best way to do it, but it sure works fine.

i don't think so

[SoftwareJanitor]

internal modems _do_ use the computers' uarts. if you've ever written a low-level serial driver you'll know this.

Wrong. Internal modems supply their own UART, usually a 16550A equivalent of some sort. You can use an internal modem with a motherboard with no on-board UARTs and no add-in serial card. The only exception to this is the dread "Winmodem", which doesn't have, nor use a UART, but rather a "bit banger" approach. Avoid the "Winmodems" at all costs, even for Windows use they stink, because they steal processor power to do things real modems do in hardware.

USR and 56k

[El Guapo]

ATS32=2 should enable v.90 on a USR 56K

try this for 56k(should work on any modem)

[xetovss]

Try setting the init string to AT&F that will put the modem to factory settings and use the speed that is determined through negotiation between the modems. You will know when you get a V.90 connection when you hear 2 pings(for a lack of a more descriptive name). Once you get the V.90 working you can set the init string to AT&FM0 to turn off the speaker if you so prefere.