Hello all, how's it going? I really need advice on this topic.

I properly moved to linux since the beginning of this year. Although there are a few things you can find/do in windows and not in linux, that didn't bother me coz i always found alternatives. However one thing that really annoys me now is my ADSL connection. I bought a PCI ADSL modem ( MRI PCI ADSL with an iTex chipset), and noticed that the company closed down shortly afterwards, leaving good drivers for Win2k, and XP, as well as VERY old and useless drivers for Redhat.

I spent a few months searching through the internet and eventually found drivers for the 2.4.18 kernel, but it was too complicated to install i lost hope. All other sites say that its hopeless for this modem.. =/ and till now i'm forced to have a win2k machine as my server for the house.

My question is, can anyone recommend a good ADSL modem which has a ballance between compatibility, recent and frequently updateded drivers, and ease of use? I dont really mind if it was a USB modem, although few told me that you get lower pings in games with USB modems compared to PCI ones...

err dont know if these would help but, I'm thinking of using Slack 9 as the OS. (hmm smoothwall? naah), and I live in London UK, with BT as my ISP if this helps in the brand/type of ADSL modem.

Thanks alot.

Get any recent Aztech modem... not USB ones (no matter what brand, you will have similar headaches, trust me ), but the ones that needs to be connected to a network card on your PC.

I only recommend what I use, and I've used Aztech ADSL modems for nearly a year and it has never died on me.

Netgear. Reliable, fast and Slackware seems to like it.

Thanks Azmeen, i dont quite understand what you meen by ones "that needs to be connected to a network card on your PC.".

quietguy47, do you recommend pci, usb, or external modems? =) thanks

Hmmm... I tend to agree with the other guys...

Whatever you do, make sure you get one with a "network" (RJ-45) port that can connect to your Ethernet card. USB is a source of major pain... And PCI, from what I have heard is not much better (Windows drivers only...).

There are a few types of ADSL modems...

1) USB modems (connects to your USB port, bloody pain in the ass in Linux)
2) PCI modems (connects to an empty PCI slot, as you've experienced, most of them are also a major pain to setup in Linux)
3) NIC-connected modems (this modem has a RJ-45 outlet (network cable, the "normal" type that you use in networking, which you connect to a network card (NIC))

The almost surely to get up and running very easily is the 3rd type. However, you need to have a network card installed on your PC. If your PC comes with an on-board NIC, then make sure it can be detected/configured under Linux.

If not, just buy one... I think you can get one at sub-US$10 prices... so it's not a pain on your wallet as well

Just as a clarification, the advice given to you has been to forget getting an internal modem that you will need drivers to support, but instead get an external ADSL modem. However, you do not want a USB connection to the external modem, but rather an Ethernet connection to it. I agree with this recommendation. This will involve getting and setting up a second Ethernet card in the computer you are using to serve your connection unless you already have two set up (alternatively, you could get a hardware based hub/router solution to serve the Internet connection to several computers in your house). There are some external modems that have both USB and Ethernet (RJ-45) connections available. These would be OK; you just would not be using the USB connection. Just be sure not to get one that has only a USB connection. I haven't really used an ADSL modem for myself (I have a cable modem), so I have no recommendation to make for which brand you should get, but one that provides standard Ethernet output will cause much fewer compatibility headaches than a USB or internal modem.

Oh ok, havent heard of NIC-modems before.. makes sense now. The only ones i saw were routers that had RJ-45 connections.. but ill look harder this time.

Thanks alot, ill look around and when all this is fixed ill keep this thread updated for anoyone else with the same problem. =)

To offer some more info to the post by Rodrin:

He is right on the money. An external ADSL modem will not need to be detected or have a driver for your OS - no matter which OS you use.

I personally use an Asus AAM6005HW ADSL modem. Since I live in China, this may be a model that's not available to you. Asus makes great products that work.

As for the network interface card (nic), you should be able to get one fairly cheap anywhere. Try to get a Realtek 8139 chipset. This is a standard that probably any OS will detect.

If you don't mind ordering off the internet, check some place like http://www.pricewatch.com - sorry but I don't know what's available in the UK.

pci network interface card
With ADSL you will need a network card and modem, most isp's provide these when you sign up. I recommend netgear because it is cheap and reliable.
I have been using the same nic for over a year and a half( netgear) and which ever modem(currently, actiontec) the isp loans me.

Chinaman, Do you have any technical info on the modem?

Hmm, im starting to get confused between these External ADSL modems, and routers...

Xushi,

First, a router is a piece of hardware that helps LANs and WANs achieve interoperability and connectivity, and can link LANs that have different network topologies (such as Ethernet and Token Ring). Routers match packet headers to a LAN segment and choose the best path for the packet, optimizing network performance. Routers are necessary for computers on different physical networks to communicate with each other. Routers forward data received from one physical network to other physical networks. They can also do other useful things, such as provide a hardware firewall. My favorite router for a soho (small office, home office) network (2 or more computers sharing the same internet connection, files, printers and/or other devices) is a Linksys BEFSX41 http://www.linksys.com/products/prod...id=29&prid=433 although I am currently using a D-Link DI-704P http://www.dlink.com/products/?pid=63 simply because I could not find the Linksys here in Kunming, nor would anyone order it, and I don't know how to order online in China from China.

A modem is a device that allows computer information to be transmitted and received over a telephone line. The transmitting modem translates digital computer data into analog signals that can be carried over a phone line. The receiving modem translates the analog signals back to digital form. For an ADSL (Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line) one must have an ADSL modem.

Looking at Asus website, both the Global, Taiwan, and N. America sites - there are no wired modems listed. Several companies are really investing heavily in the wireless market, for both modems and routers. Personally, I think this is driven by the recent OS changes brought about by Windows XP Pro. However, I don't want to start a flame. Wireless costs more, and when you depend upon the airwaves for transmission, more things can go wrong than with wires. There may be objections to that statement, but none based upon fact - just feelings. Try this fact out while you shop - wireless devices cost more than devices which use wires.

I did find an ADSL Combo Modem at D-Link http://www.dlink.com/products/?pid=67 (D-Link DSL-320G), which looks pretty good to me. Unless I read the specs wrong, you can connect your computer to this modem with either ethernet (RJ-45 cable, which looks like a big phone line) or USB. For that reason, you can use this one with 2 computers without buying an additional device such as a hub or router.

Getting back to the ADSL modem issue, as quietguy47 suggested in his post, your ISP may loan you one. That's where mine came from. This is my first ADSL connection - in the States I used cable, so I have never bought an ADSL modem. However, if the ISP doesn't loan or rent you one, they should also be able to suggest where you may purchase one locally.

Let someone know if this helps you any.

My BroadMax Linkmax ADSL Modem/Router seems to work for me: it's the one I got from Earthlink when I signed up for their DSL Service. I have not had problems with it, and Earthlink was very helpful when it came to configuring it for direct PPPoE dialup (as opposed to having it act as a router/DHCP server.) After some minor fiddling with settings, and such, I got my debian distro to turn on the connection at boot. The reason I did this is because if the modem is set to its default mode, it acts as, like I said, a hardware router with a mean old firewall, and pages I wanted to serve were not visible to the outside world because of this. Earthlink would not give me the firmware i needed to access the modem's full router capabilities, and I have been unable to find any resources on this.

Long story short, it worked for me, debian and winblows. Definitely get an external ADSL modem, and hook that badboy into your NIC port. And if you want to serve, get a proper router!

Don't be confused... Most NIC-connected ADSL modems are actually mini-routers... Yeah... that's right! If you don't believe me then open up one of these babies and you can see some chips that are similarly used in full-featured routers as well.

To understand what makes a network device a router, you have to have some idea of the way networks operate. I don't wish to go into all the details in this post because that would be a textbook, but the relevant network layers are the physical layer, the data link layer and the network layer.

Network connection devices which operate purely at the physical layer don't pay any attention to the data contained within packets that are sent to them. If they receive a packet on one interface, they resend it on every other interface available. No decisions are made about the data; it is resent blindly. Devices that operate on this layer are called repeaters or, if they have more than two interfaces, hubs (which can also be correctly referred to as repeaters).

Network connection devices that operate on the datalink layer pay attention to the part of any packet that is sent to them known as the frame header (and also the frame trailer, technically). This contains the hardware address(es), or MAC address(es), that the packet is intended to be sent to. These devices make decisions as to what to do with packets based on the MAC address information. MAC address information is not hierarchical. That means that there is no way to determine, based on this information, in which direction to send a packet without knowing the MAC address of the specific device it is intended to be picked up by. Because this information would choke any network of too great a scale it is only passed on to other devices within the same network segment separated only by physical or data link layer devices. In other words, it is never passed beyond a device that operates on the next higher level, that is, a router. Devices that operate on this layer are called bridges (pretty much considered obsolete) and switches.

Network connection devices that operate on the network layer pay attention to the part of any packet they pick up that is known as the network header. This contains hierarchical network addresses of recipients, which are known as network addresses. In the case of TCP/IP, the protocol that the Internet is based on, this is the number address that you sometimes see (like 64.179.4.146, the address of www.linuxquestions.org). Because this information is hierarchical, these devices don't have to know the specific destination of the packet; they only have to know in which direction to send it (which interface to forward it on) and the network and MAC address of the next hop, the next router in the chain (or the destination on the last hop). They determine the next hop based on the first so many bits of the destination network address depending on what netmask they are configured with. The netmask length varies depending on what level of the hierarchy the device is operating on. Devices that operate on this layer are routers. A router is required to connect network segments that operate on different levels of the network address hierarchy and/or segments that contain addresses which differ within the netmask.

If an ADSL modem only provides the possibility of one network address to its user, then it is effectively not a router (although the hardware may be capable of performing that way if configured differently; it's actually whether it has a separate IP address for itself and the computer it's hooked up to that determines whether it is technically working as a router). If it will provide more than one address to the user (although you may need a hub or a switch to make use of them), then it is a router. You can use an ADSL modem which is not working as a router with a hardware router or a computer acting as a router to share its connection using IP masquerading. You do not need a separate router to share a connection from an ADSL modem which is acting as a router.