Modem configuration for Fax

rewtedesco · 05-07-2007, 11:55 AM

I'm trying to get an internal fax modem to work as an actual FAX sending (and possibly receiving) device. (Intel Corporation FA82537EP 56K V.92 Data/Fax Modem PCI according to /etc/sysconfig/hwconf) . As it is, efax doesn't do a thing: can't find modem device, if I specify, e.g., /dev/ttyS1 it just hangs, etc.

While things like setting up a network (I'm on a LAN with 3 PCs on a cable modem) appears very simple due to a lot of fancy gui-driven configuration tools in either Fedora or Suse and other distros, there appears to be a real lack of "convenient" or at least functional software when it comes to setting up a modem for FAX.
So for a few hours now I've been trying to figure out how to make this work. I'm trying to use fax/efax/efix and the first problem is that there isn't a device /dev/modem. Nothing seems to be set up from the installation. So I have a lot of questions. What device should it be? One of these /dev/ttyS0 dev's? Which one? How to figure it out? What are the config files.

OkOk a little more systematic:

a) Is there a decent configuration tool available that would make this process easy as, e.g., changing the screen resolution? I'm running Fedora Core 6.
b) If not, what's a good start to figure this out? (Tell me which trees to bark up first, I'm not sure if I'm in the right forest. )

Lenard · 05-07-2007, 12:19 PM

Get the scanModem.gz file from: http://linmodems.technion.ac.il/packages/scanModem.gz

Extract it then from the terminal type: chmod +x scanModem

Then type: scanModem

When done have a look at the resulting file: Modem/ModemData.txt

Also see: http://tldp.org/HOWTO/Linmodem-HOWTO-5.html

rewtedesco · 05-07-2007, 03:04 PM

Thanks for the links. I downloaded the software, installed it and could confirm using
scanmodems that I have a 537EP modem. Then following the content of the
file in ~/Modem/Intel.txt I found the link for the drivers. They are quite old,
the last ones for Fedora are for version 2.6 - while I have version 6.
So I tried to use the software version from Intel's site but that doesn't
compile. To start, the include file /usr/include/linux/config.h does not
exist on my machine. (I have all kernel headers though). So the build,
make 537, fails right away because of undeclared symbols.
The structure of the include files directory has changed
quite a bit since Fedora 2, it seems.

Lenard · 05-07-2007, 05:13 PM

That's the problem with the older things are with the newer kernels. Many, many things have changed in the kernel since the drivers were first created.

Maybe it is time to get a new modem (pci, usb or a real serial modem that has a uart).

teckk · 05-07-2007, 08:59 PM

Quote:

the last ones for Fedora are for version 2.6 - while I have version 6.

You sure that isn't fedora using kernel 2.6? There is no fedora 2.6
FC6 does use kernel 2.6

Your best bet is to get a real modem, not a wintel modem. (not really a modem). Any external 56k modem will work. One with it's own processor and UART. Wintel modems aren't modems. They use the CPU's processor and instuctions along with windows drivers to do their thing.

External 56k modems should be had for $5 I would think.

rewtedesco · 05-08-2007, 06:10 AM

You're right. I checked again. There isn't a version 2.6 Fedora. And you're right it was refering to the kernel version, and it seems there is software that might work.
I don't think I have a win modem. It's an Intel FA82537EP, and doesn't seem entirely hopeless.

I downloaded another version of the driver software, this time from "http://phep2.technion.ac.il/linmodems/packages/intel/Philippe.Vouters/" which is the site specified by the program scanmodems (see 2nd post in this thread by Lenard) and tried again. The makefile highest in the hierarchy contains a flimpsy way to determine the specific modem device type with awk and sed and other geek tools and fails because the format of the string generated by lspci has changed. So I just deleted that part and directly specified the name of the modem in the makefile. For Fedora it was also necessary to spcify the paths of insmod as /sbin/insmod and similarly for rmmod and some others. Eventually I got it to work and it loaded a module Interl537.ko into the kernel.

Now efax does "something" but still fails. I'll work on that later. For starters, I have to first purchase a telephone cable to hook it voip box, and then find a friend who is willing to accept some junk test fax....