[wellylug] newbie installation question

[Nick Jensen]

On Tue, 09 Nov 2004 21:31:47 +0000, firstname lastname
<post_box_ at hotmail.com> wrote:
> 1. i have an external modem (US Robotics 56KB message modem) which i do not
> think has been detected durring the mandrake installation. i can not see it
> listed under hardware or peripherals. how can i check that the modem is
> recognised in mandrake and if it has not been recognised how do i force
> mandrake to recognise it?

 Hi there - unfortunately getting a 56k modem to be recognised by
Linux can be quite tricky - the reason being (roughly) that (nearly)
every company that makes modems creates drivers for it so Windows will
recognise it, and Windows will then incorporate the drivers into the
Operating System so the modem is automatically recognised. However,
there's less money in Linux, so the companies spend much less time
writing drivers for it.
 There are various places you can look for drivers for Linux, but my
advice (the advice I took) is to go back to Dick Smith and get their
generic 56k internal modem for $29 - it comes with drivers for lots of
Linux distributions including Mandrake, and it works well and fast.
 I hope I haven't put you off Linux with this little tirade, I nearly
got put off it several years ago when I first tried to connect to the
internet and realised I had to learn what the difference between a
software and hardware modem was. But persevere, it's good fun, and if
you get the Dick Smith modem you can bypass all the agonising I had to
do.

    Nick