On Monday July 15 1996, Russell Brooks wrote to John Piper ...

 JP>> Fellow USR users, welcome me to the ranks of proud USR

 RB>  Welcome, Oh Gracious Zealot

Thanks Russell. I knew you'd be the first to cheer when you heard!

 JP> V.Everything owners. I bought one yesterday at a very good price, and so
 JP> far things seems to be well.

 RB> Bout time....we nagged you enough.

YOU nagged me enough, yes. :-)

 RB> Good things come to those who wait.

I'm an implusive buyer. I woke up one morning last week, decided I wanted
to buy a new modem, decided on a Courier, rang Modem Connection in
Melbourne, got some information and a recommendation, and then bought it.
When I installed it the next day, I had to do virtually nothing to make it
work properly.

 RB> I am very pleased that you could finally get a Courier. As you can see,
 RB> they are a cut above the rest.

Certainly. However, a few people have had problems connecting to it. Some
are experiencing freezes and delays in drawing menus (I did myself when I
hooked
up the M11F to the spare notebook), and more disturbing, one of my regular
callers always loses carrier whenever a message is displayed. He logs in,
the system checks his mail, and when he presses (Enter) to read his mail,
he is cut off. It's happened every time without fail. I'm at a loss to
understand why the displaying of a message would cause a sudden disconnect.

 RB> Have you had any 33600/33600 connects yet??

I have tested my Courier with a number of systems. I have a downlink in
Mudgee, a downlink in Melbourne and two points, one who has a 33.6k modem
(I'm not sure which brand -- not a Courier though). So far all of my
downlinks seem to be doing fine. I have no way of knowing whether or not my
connects were 33600 in both directions.

I have had a few 33600 connects. 31200 is more common though. I crashmailed
David Drummond on the weekend, and I achieved 28800. He later told me in a
return netmail that he had another modem online at the time, but even so,
it was a good solid connect.

David crashmailed me back the following morning and (according to my
mailer's log), he achieved 33600. He posted me the diagnostics for that
session. These report a different connect speed altogether. I'll post the
log snippet to you here if you like.

Steven Andreson connected at 31200 yesterday, and from hat he says, his
phone line is shocking. He didnt experience any difficulties while
connected here.

 RB> I would be interested in a dump of your best online stats when you are
 RB> in the middle of your best connect. (To another Courier preferably)

 RB> While online at 33600/33600, do +++

I called another BBS running a V.E the other day. Typing +++ had no effect
at all. I did toggle the DIP switch to disable carrier loss on +++.

 RB> then ATi6i7i11y11 (with capture on of course) now ATO1 to return to normal

I'll have to try that. Is there any other way to drop to command mode?

 RB> I want to check your S/N, near & far echo and signal strengths.
If you are
 RB> using the same lines as you used too ( with the Dynalink, Simplemodem, and
 RB> Netcomm ) this should tell us one way or the other if it was your lines
 RB> that were not up to scratch or those modems. I don't want to start a war
 RB> here...I just want to know that you can get the best out of your Courier.

Fair enough. In terms of setting it up, all I did was enter a terminal,
issue AT&F1&K3&W and used ATZ from then on. No problems so far.
Not having to fiddle with multiple settings is one feature I was quite
impressed with.

 RB> The only troubles you may have, are either you or your users connecting
 RB> (with inferior modems...older VFC modems) at no higher than 26400. But
 RB> this could be a thing of the past soon with near everyone going to 33600
 RB> (rockwell) or better still... Seeing the light and buying a courier.

Hopefully. :-) The caller (who is having problems staying connected) has a
Lightfax 1414LC according to the answers he submitted when he first logged
in over a year ago. He hasn't had any problems connecting and staying online
to the M11F I was using before, but it is disturbing that the same can't be
said of the Courier.

John (japp{at}mpx.com.au)

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