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Comment by IntelMiner | Hacker News Reader

The OS support says "Windows"

Weren't USR modems famous for being some of the better Linux compatible modems back in the day? (As opposed to cheap crappy "WinModems" that overtook everything)

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All modems were compatible with Linux until very late in the piece, when so-called WinModems appeared commercially IIRC ~1998.[0] In these, processing done in hardware on other modems was offloaded to the CPU via closed source systems. This was probably only possible as CPUs had become faster, and was likely done to save cash and PCB space in Y2K-era laptops. I think they were eventually largely supported under Linux, but basically by this time nobody needed them anymore. The reason modems were all so well supported was that a stable serial interface was largely supported across the board by all vendors. After serial line configuration, only vendor-specific extensions and a slow evolution of additional features such as caller ID differed. Some Aussie examples (ignore the two at right): https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/50/Australi...

[0] Just checked and those dates are ~correct https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Softmodem

> but basically by this time nobody needed them anymore.

Not quite. Broadband was getting significant adoption, but it was more expensive and not available everywhere, so most people stayed on dial-up for years to come. Visitors to this site old enough to recall that era would very likely have been early adopters, so it's easy to have the perspective that dial-up went away circa 2000, when it really didn't, it merely peaked... It wasn't until the 2010s when dial-up disappeared.

But that also discounts travel... Even if you had broadband at home, the world wasn't blanketed with Wi-Fi like it is now. Only the best hotels had ethernet jacks, and cellular data was still very slow and with very high per-minute usage fees. So laptops continued to come with rj11 jacks for years to come.

AN OPINIONATED HISTORY OF THE MODEM

~1960s-1980s: critically important for HIGH SPEED LEASED LINE[0] MAINFRAME[1] MINICOMPUTERS[2] IMPs[3] and PADs[4] (~100-300-1200bps).

1980s-early 1990s: Hayes serial modem AT command set released.[H] Modems critically important for BBSs, UUCP, Amiga/PC warez scenes, early open source distribution. (2400bps/9600bps/14.4/28.8/56k)

~early 1990s: critically important for early internet growth which largely supplants BBSs (56k) and coincides with the initial popularity surge for Linux

~1995-2000: broadband grows rapidly in developed countries. It really kicks the llama's ass. Early P2P warez via Gnutella, MP3 and DivX. CD burning is rife. ISO images are a thing. Against this background, Sony's minidisc fails but accidentally enshrines funny Finns rapping as history.[5]

~1998 winmodem! KK System releases Fax U and popularizes negotiation sounds as art.[6]

~1999: Somebody picks up the phone[7] and the modem connection drops.

~2000-2005: potentially viable but declining option vs broadband (Mbps). Even China had >Mbps HFC broadband at this time. DVDs are mainstream. Steam, Valve's revolutionary harbinger of online software distribution for desktops, is released.

~2004: Artists use modems as current subjects.[8]

~2005-2010: poor countries and extreme desperation only. Physical distribution of software wanes.

~2010: 56k becomes slower than mobile data in most places. Many countries cease hauling copper pair due to mobile plus copper thievery. The developing world comes online without legacy copper infrastructure.

~2013: Artists use modems as retro subjects.[9]

~now = Amusing historical tidbit. Slower than mobile data that's 3 generations old.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leased_line [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mainframe_computer [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minicomputer [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interface_Message_Processor [4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Packet_assembler/disassembler [H] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hayes_command_set [5] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ymNFyxvIdaM [6] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MmQSROkTb3c [7] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xphxPPQXJKw [8] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJSQILBGoqk [9] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cfdZUnHkuuI

Phew. A nice Sunday morning dalliance: back to work :)

The external serial ones will work with anything, and they say "OS Compatibility: Windows, Linux" but really any OS would see these as just serial devices.

Would the PCI-E one work under Linux? I've got an old 98/XP/Linux machine that would be fun to stick a modem into for the novelty. Unfortunately the PCI slots are all taken up

PCI-E for that old of a machine?

Why not use the USB one? https://www.usr.com/products/56k-dialup-modem/usr5637/

Just as an aside, even if it turns out to be a Winmodem, many of them can still be used under Linux. Towards the end of the modem era there were a couple of open source efforts to create Linux drivers for popular Winmodem chipsets. LTMODEM was one of them. For reasons I don't understand, most were unable to do 56k/v92bis though.

The other interesting thing about Winmodems/softmodems, is that they could also be used for stuff besides serial data transmission. In particular, you could use them to send/receive faxes and handle voice calls. This latter ability was particularly neat.

No idea if they're still supported, but the Asterisk telephony package could even use inexpensive PCI modems as part of a PBX, to connect to analog devices on either the internal (wired phones) or external (POTS phone line) sides. This is a bit less impressive today, when you can buy a cheap SIP ATA for $20, than it was in the late 90s / early 00s when I first heard about it.

All modems could do fax, not just softmodems.

The page says they sell both controller-based and winmodems.

But Linux works with some winmodems: http://www.linmodems.org/

I still have a Psion 5mx with a USR modem connected via a null cable. This thread intrigues me to try connecting via dial-up again and see what/if something works with Psion browser

I miss my Psion series 5. The screen cable between the two halves is bad. The keyboard was amazing for a pocket device.

You used to be able to get replacement cables pretty cheaply, so it could be a fun project to try and resurrect.

To the op, I used a Psion 5 with serial cable as a data center serial terminal for year :)

They worked fine on Macs. Ran a Mac BBS off of one.

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