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1. Introduction

This is the Linux Linmodem Mini-HOWTO document. It is intended as a quick reference to help you find out if there is a way to get your (so-called) winmodem working under Linux, and, if so, how to do it. You should understand from the outset that there is probably not support for your winmodem: at this time, there is limited support for such modems, often in the form of vendor-created but vendor-unsupported, binary-only kernel modules; however, a small number of open-source projects exist. For the most up-to-date information about available Linmodem drivers, visit Rob Clark's site and the Linmodems.org site. General modem issues, such as IRQ settings and dialup scripts, are dealt with much more thoroughly in the more general Modem-HOWTO, Serial-HOWTO, PPP-HOWTO, and other related HOWTOs available at the Linux Documentation Project site.

1.1 Copyright

Copyright (c) 2000 by Sean Walbran, Marvin Stodolsky

Please freely copy and distribute (sell or give away) this document in any format. It's requested that corrections and/or comments be fowarded to the document maintainer. You may create a derivative work and distribute it provided that you:

If you're considering making a derived work other than a translation, it's requested that you discuss your plans with the current maintainer.

1.2 Disclaimer

Use the information in this document at your own risk. I disavow any potential liability for the contents of this document. Use of the concepts, examples, and/or other content of this document is entirely at your own risk.

All copyrights are owned by their owners, unless specifically noted otherwise. Use of a term in this document should not be regarded as affecting the validity of any trademark or service mark. In particular, since the term "Winmodem" is a trademark of US Robotics/3Com, we use the term "winmodem" here as does Rob Clark: to be read as "Winmodems(tm), host-based modems, HCF-modems, HSP-modems, and all similar modem-like hardware." Linux is a trademark of Linus Torvalds.

Naming of particular products or brands should not be seen as endorsements.

It are strongly recommended to make a backup of important and/or relevant files before any installation procedure.

1.3 Credits

(Note: Should check with these people to make sure it's okay to publish names and email addresses/web sites.)

Thanks to Willie Green (willjr(at)lcc.net) for his fine contribution of the ESS modem section.

Thanks to Mark Spieth (mark(at)digivation.com.au), who contributed his "fixscript" for module kernel version editing to the Linmodem mailing list here , and which is included in the appendix to this document.

The remaining information contained in this document comes a variety of great sources such as Rob Clark's site, the good people at Linmodems.org, and on their mailing lists, and Werner Heuser's LiLAC: Linux Laptop Modem page.

This document itself was created using the SGML HOWTO template created by Stein Gojen, as described in the HOWTO-HOWTO. site.

1.4 Updates and Corrections

Do you have a Linmodem which works, but is not described here? Are you developing a driver? Do you think something in this document is incorrect or misleading? Do you think that your or someone else's work has been used here but not appropriately credited? Please don't hesitate to email me at sean(at)walbran.org with corrections and suggestions.


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