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Comment by jlgaddis | Hacker News Reader

> those tones

It's my ring tone. I love the weird looks on people's faces when I'm in a meeting and my phone rings -- especially the "older" crowd (some of the "youngsters" don't recognize the sound).

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Did you know each manufacturer had a unique sound for their v90 handshake? This one sounds like a Lucent WinModem. (Based on listening to the sounds here[1]. Yay for RealAudio!) The USR/3Com modems were two "bongs" (four if the higher speed failed). But I was always fond of the Rockwell sweep[2].

Of course, required reading is HN favorite Oona Räisänen's excellent analysis of a modem handshake.

[1] http://modemsite.com/56k/trouble3.asp

[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vvr9AMWEU-c

[3] http://www.windytan.com/2012/11/the-sound-of-dialup-pictured...

The 'bongs' were known in the trade as the depth charges.

Yeah, I listened to the file and immediately thought: that's not how my US Robotics sounded! It's amazing how one remembers it after all these years. In my case, it's probably because of the poor line quality, one always connected with the sound on, and one prayed quite a bit to get a good connection.

Damn. Nostalgia hit right there. I had a lucent winmodem. I rrmembrr the time when i did my firts switch to linux ( redhat 7) and there was no way in making it work there:( luckily I found a isa modem (33k) that was compatible out of the box, those were the times

Anybody else here guilty of stripping the low pass filters out of their local lines at night? Sure improved throughput :)

I used to listen for the noise to determine if a connection was successful. I would disconnect promptly if it sounded bad. One day I think south Florida got a new area code or something...954 and I was still calling the 305 number for the BBS in Mismi (or something I was maybe 10 at the time, things are kinda fuzzy). At the end of the month found it my parents got charged $.25 per call because it's now considered long distance.

We were just talking about this a couple days ago at work! If you listened very carefully to the handshake, you could tell what the quality connection you had. After awhile, you could even guess the final baud from the sound of the handshake, and if it was bad, you'd try reconnecting a few times to see if you could get a better connection.

The Rockwell sweep always made me think of Neo leaving the Matrix for the real world.

Absolutely! I had a USRobotics 16.8k Dual-Standard modem that I bought in 1992 under the discounted Sysop program and that thing made the coolest noises of any modem I ever owned.

You may enjoy this from the awesome windytan.com, an annotated spectrum analysis and detailed description of the steps involved in a modem dialling up an ISP and negotiating a connection: http://www.windytan.com/2012/11/the-sound-of-dialup-pictured...

Mine too! I have the V.92 version, which gives careful listeners the impression of a slight anachronism since most people stopped hearing those tones before V.92 came out. :)

It definitely causes double takes on the rare occasions my phone isn't on silent and I receive and actual phone call.

Thanks for the handshake tone! The more, the merrier: did anyone archive examples from 1200bps up?

I've also been fruitlessly searching for line noise examples ~~~~~}}~00 etc. Remote Access had a line noise simulator; someone has to have details…

Curiously the key fits with the track I was listening to at the time: Dusky's Stick By This. Kind of interesting listening to them together.

Such a great idea :-)

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