-=> Quoting John Piper to All on 22 Dec 96  09:28:47<=-
-=> Subject "33600 connects" <=-

 JP> In my experience with 33600 modems (USR and Rockwells), I've never
 JP> personally managed a 33600 connect. I have connected Courier to M34F,
 JP> Courier to Courier, generic Rockwell to M34F, yet I've never managed
 JP> 33600. I've also never seen inbound 33600 connects. 31200 seems
 JP> common, as does 28800. 
 JP> This leads me to believe that a) none of the modems I have seen and
 JP> used have quite got their acts together; or b) it's a matter of having
 JP> an exceptionally clean phone line (close to an exchange -- at both
 JP> ends) with which to connect. 

You need to have an exceptional line to manage a 33.6 connect. I have
managed to connect to a friend in the same suburb repeatedly and farily
reliably (for such a high speed) at this speed. However, one need to
consider whether or not it is worth the trouble for the tiny bit of extra
bandwidth.

 JP> I'm inclined to dismiss the former in favour of the latter. Maybe I'm
 JP> missing something else here ...

 JP> One important note: While I have never CONNECTED at 33600 bps, I have
 JP> dropped into terminal mode, checked the link stats and noticed a shift
 JP> to 33600/33600. I've once ever seen this ONCE, but it's probably safe
 JP> to assume that the same has happened during PPP connects to work, as
 JP> well as other connects to modems capable (?) of connecting at 33600
 JP> bps.

The reason of course is that your modem has detected that the lines have
improved, and has retrained. The reason it might not start off at 28.8 is
there is some sort of "problem" with the exchange - maybe it has trouble
with noise at the start.

 JP> I am attack-dialling Paul Sanders's Dragon now to see what sort of
 JP> connect my Courier manages to his modem. I will report back ... as
 JP> soon as I am able to actually connect (his line has been busy for as
 JP> long as I've been dialling).
 JP> On another side note, interestingly, I've noticed that a lot of 33.6k
 JP> Courier owners have mostly connected at 19200 bos to my own modem.
 JP> Possibly this is a line/exchange issue at their end, but I do receive
 JP> a lot more 19200 connects than I ever did with a NetComm M11F (V.FC).
 JP> One last issue: I'm not sure what type of exchange mine is, but I will
 JP> try to find out as soon as I can. Perhaps my exchange type is
 JP> responsible for making 33600 initial connects impossible. Does anyone
 JP> know what type of exchange the Hurstville (NSW) exchange is?

I have often observed this with my Maestro E336. Could this possibly be due
to the fact that the modems are too optimistic, whereas with the VFC connect
it can't retrain often because of the time it takes.
Regards,
Peter.

---
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port{at}pcug.org.au (Internet E-mail)
Peter Ortner, 3:620/243 (FidoNet)

... I have a 9600 bps modem and 1.5 bps fingers!
--- GEcho 1.12/beta+