Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

[jed]

I'm a new Puppy user. I recently installed Puppy 4.1 and configured wireless access. That was pretty painless. I'm configuring this machine for my elderly mother and unfortunately there is no wifi access where she lives so we're resorting to dial-up. I cannot get puppy to detect the modem. It is a PCI_SV92PP Agere Soft Modem. I read that the Agere modems were supported. Is this a supported modem? Or is there more information I need to gather?

[ieee488]

Unless someone has this very exact PCI modem, the only way to know for sure is to run scanmodem tool which you will have to download and take over to your Puppy pc.

[url]linmodems.org[/url]

[JaniceM]

Hello Jed,
Good luck with that modem!!. If you find a way to make it work in Puppy 4.1.1, I want to know. Have been working this issue for four days and nights. See thread by JaniceM. The remarks under this post may save you a lot of work and research. No need to re-invent the wheel. I don't want to discourage you, but I am falling back to an earlier version that they say works with this modem. We will see. Sorry I can't offer you any other advise. Just trying to save you a lot of headaches. See comments by ICPUG under my thread. I am going with those instructions. Maybe you could do the same. Will check back later. Good luck. Let me know what you decide. JaniceM

[rerwin]

jed,
Some Agere modems are supported in linux; some aren't. Run Menu > System > PupScan and click the "PCI interfaces" button. Find the entry relating to the modem; it will probably show a VENDOR of 11c1. If the DEVICE is 048c or 048f, Puppy supports it. If it is 1040, it is questionable -- apparently there was partial support a year ago with the possibility of further development (not by Puppy), so you could try it anyway.

For these devices, run Menu > System > BootManager and add the following with the "...add a new module" button: agrserial.

If yours is not one of these devices, it apparently won't work in linux. However, there are many other PCI W/LinModems out there, which you might get (used) from a shop that recycles old PCs. Just avoid any Rockwell, Conexant or 3Com chipsets. The trusty old Lucent 1646T00 or Agere 1648T00 chipsets work fine, as do PCTel, SmartLink and Ambient chipsets. Good luck.
Richard

[thelash]

Just to add a comment - the lucent winmodem in my ibm t22 laptop was automatically detected in puppy 217. Puppy 4.1 and 4.2 have been a hassle:
Pupdial would claim to have detected my modem, and called it ttySM0.
Set up phone no username etc - no dialout.
Test modem - no modem detected.
Go to probe - no modem found.
Use erase box and reboot - no modem.
Eventually had success by loading ltserial AND ltmodem (dont' know why - tried ltserial on its own and it didn't work) from the blacklist and rebooting.
Pupdial then successfully found a modem at ttySLTM0.

BTW, my modem is described in pupscan as vendor 11cl, device 045c and kernel module ltserial

cheers

[rerwin]

thelash,
Thanks for your report. You did not mention modifying the BootManager's "Give preference" list; that is the only place you should have to adjust, to select between the martian_dev and ltserial drivers.

In 4.1/4.1.2, the preference is set to use only the ltserial/ltmodem driver. In 4.2 it is set to martian_dev, but can be overridden. Martian_dev is associated with ttySM0, ltserial with ttySLTM0. If one of those is already set and you change the preference, you need to do the probe-ERASE-and-reboot dance to get the other device name.

So, if in 4.2 the ttySM0 device does not work, use "Give preference..." and add the line:
martian_dev:ltserial

That line in how 4.1/4.1.2 does it. The ltmodem dependency should be handled automatically; you can verify that they are both loaded by looking for them in the output of the lsmod command in a console/terminal.

Please try that again. You know the modem can be made to work; but you should not have to mickey-mouse it. If there is still a problem, I need to investigate.
Richard

PS: Be sure to try this on a new pupsave, to avoid possible conflicts from upgrading the pupsave. As a last resort, try entering the command:
depmod
and rebooting. Your modem is listed in the 4.1.2 file that associates hardware to driver, so this is a mystery, to me.

[thelash]

thanks rerwin. I did not realize (because I didn't do it that way) that I could use the 'bootmanager configure bootup' program to set up my modem - I went into pupdial-probe, and used the 'blacklist' box to load up ltserial and proceeded from there to get a successful dialup using ttySLTM0.
Appreciate your input on this part of the forum, and love the way that with Puppy there is always a way. I play around with other distros, but I've learnt 99% of what I know about Linux from Puppy and guys like you.
Cheers