Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!wuarchive!usc!celia!techsys!pain!adamr From: adamr@pain.UUCP (Adam Ravid) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.modems Subject: Telebit vs. Intel (Deciding was hard). Message-ID: Date: 23 May 91 06:55:20 GMT Organization: Public Access Info Network (818/776-1447) Lines: 41 After a month of suffering, not sure of which modem to buy, I finally had a showdown... I had two deals, and the last remaining factors were v32bis and the price! The two modems were Telebit T1600 and Intel 9600ex. The Telebit had a few added features: security, built-in protocols, louder carrier for attempting to prevent fallback in v42bis, and about $75 bucks more expensive. The Intel had a 5 year warranty three more than the Telebit, and has been reported to 'talk' with Telebits T2500 just fine. The cost-effective choice was the Intel. Here's why. The transfer rates of the two modems were very close (from statistics taken by fellow netters - the Telebits might have been faster when talking among themselves, but not by much --- [not counting PEP]). This and the use of Telebit's built-in protocols (xmodem,ymodem,kermit, uucp) will cost very little in time --- estimated at maybe one minute/day. Since I call a local site, I reasoned that an extra half-hour a month, (one minute longer a day) would not make any difference in cost for me... (even more -- an hour/month, two hours... - what's the difference, at 3am in the morning, there isn't that much activity -- an extra five minutes would be just as un-noticeable as the rest of the hour long connection.) So if one modem is just a tiny bit faster, it makes very little difference. The Telebit's security I did not need. The teasing feature: louder carrier, I reasoned would probably be useful in a v32 connection, but when v32bis is released, because of the growing back to the maximum speed after a fallback due to line noise is added, the prevention of fallback will not be as important. I'll hopefully receive my Intel in less then a week (UPS second day). Can't wait for the v32bis upgrade... Good luck deciding which modem to buy.... I know I sure as heck was frustrated for a whole month. BTW, here's my setup: I'm on an IBM/AT 286 machine running a wannabe unix and/or mail & newsreader: waffle(v1.64). BTW, I'm not with Intel, just a customer. -- ism!wilbur!techsys!pain!adamr Public Access Information Network (818/776-1447) ++ Waffle BBS v1.64 ++