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The reason that your modems don't work directly from DOS is because they are
Plug & Pray compliant and only know how to communicate with the operating
system via Win-95 specs, and not directly with DOS-- as older modems did.
When you're in a DOS Window, you are really talking to them via Windows, but
you may not see it this way.
Unfortunately, there is a price to pay if one attempts to drag the past into
the future :) -- probably a bit like trying to drive a Model-T on the
freeway-- It might be possible under the right conditions, but the wisdom
of such a feat might be challenged by your road-raged freeway companions.
Your choices are to surrender to the altar of Gates and humbly accept that
it is wiser to communicate with the outside world via your internal
Win-Modem and accept the fact that the pretty little flashing lights on the
external box are just window-dressing --or-- jump back to the Jurassic era
and drag something like a pre-plug & pray U.S. Robotics 28.8 modem into the
mix. This will profoundly confuse your Plug & Pray apparatus and add to the
potential pool of conflicts, IRQ and otherwise.
They never promised you a rose garden and nobody ever guaranteed that life
would be pretty... :)
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At 09:50 PM 3/11/98 -0500, you wrote:
>Well - I also do a ritual chant and pass a bundle of smelly herbs over the box
>when I'm doing an installation. Can't hurt <g>.
>
>Frankly - all this stuff drives me nuts.
>I'll give you a "for example". I like to use an external modem - so I can see
>the lights and hear the sounds and know the status of my connection (by ear).
>Also - my new computer has a WinModem - which isn't supposed to work with DOS
>programs. So I set up an external modem. And both the WinModem and the
external
>modem work with DOS programs when I run them through the DOS prompt in
Windows -
>but neither works when I leave Windows and work in native DOS. I've spoken to
>the box manufacturer technical support and the modem manufacturer technical
>support - and no one has a clue why this is happening. And you wonder why I'm
>superstitious. Perhaps I didn't use enough garlic <g>. Robyn
>
>Ron Augustine wrote:
>
>> Robyn,
>>
>> It would be really nice if life were that simple! ;-)
>>
>> Win-95 Plug & Pray assigns your IRQs to your COM ports and other devices at
>> will and leaves your sensitivities and superstitions out of the process. It
>> will also re-assign them as new devices are added and removed. You can
>> venture in and manually change the mandated assignments if you know what
>> you're doing, but you risk creating further conflicts and may disable PnP
>> from working its wizardry on the next addition to your machine.
>>
>> Some add-on devices are designed to use only specific IRQs and
>> base-addresses that may or may not be available at any given point in the
>> evolution of your machine. These anomalies can sometimes cause conflicts
>> but this is changing as peripheral manufacturers and later versions of Plug
>> & Pray get more in lock-step with the Gates' juggernaut...
>
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