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Re: [hylafax-users] problems with Multitech Modem MT 2834ZDXb



On 2003.10.06 13:33 Karl Denninger wrote:

However, the troubling common point behind all this is that somehow,
my
various fax machines, many made by HP (various "all in one" products)
over
the years have NEVER failed to send or receive a fax.  Not once.  Oh
sure,
a couple of times they ran into a noisy line and had to have the
transmission
resent, but never once did I find a machine on the other end that
would
simply not talk to these machines.

This happens <ALL THE TIME> with "fax modems", irrespective of brand,
and
there are people out there, myself included, who consider it
completely
unacceptable behavior bordering on false advertising when a company
sells
a modem claiming fax compatability that in fact can talk to WELL UNDER
100%
of the fax machines out here.  I can see the occasional (as in under a
1%)
failure rate, but my experience is that the "fail to connect and/or
send/receive") rate is closer to 10% - and in some cases even worse.
In
some cases the modems can reliably send but not receive, or
vice-versa.

Karl, I'll afford you some latitude to openly voice your complaints without my rebuttal about an outdated modem with troublesome firmware knowing that you had such a headache with them before, but it is quite erronious to take that experience and subsequently categorize "all fax modems" as similar beasts. You simply have no license to make blanket reliability statements that cover all fax modems - or even all fax modems made by any particular manufacturer (including MultiTech) when, by virtue of your statements, you obviously have not had the faith or made the effort to know better.


A 10% failure rate is completely unacceptable, and you are misconstruing your own situation if you expect everyone out here to believe that such a failure rate is anywhere near normal or that everyone should simply accept such failures as normal for "all fax modems". I've never even seen such sustained failure rates with the worst Class 2.0 firmware from USR.

There are a lot of us out here that see failure rates on sending and receiving well, well under the 1% margin. Now, I have never owned a magically bullet-proof HP all-in-one device, but I did own a Canon fax machine, and it was the reason I started using HylaFAX in the first place. And since I began using HylaFAX I've never seen the rate of problems that I did with that fax machine. It is a completely common thing for me to see 1000 faxes received or sent these days with no reproducible errors. If you're seeing 10% failure rates then you really need to take a serious look at fixing your own setup, and you only have the license to blame yourself, not "all fax modems", for your situation.

Granted, I mostly use Class 1 for everything these days which shifts most of the responsibility of fax protocol onto HylaFAX, but I've seen some Class 2/2.0/2.1 firmwares, including MultiTech's current firmware on their MT5634 line, do virtually as well. Granted, all Class 2 firmwares are not created equal, and with enough time anyone will likely bump into a modem with Class 2 firmware bugs. It's at that point that you would need to either switch to Class 1, get the firmware fixed, or switch modems. Merely looking at the "supported modems" list on the HylaFAX website is not sufficient to guarantee anything except minimum functionality. If your modem does not support Class 1 and Class 2 then buying it risks wasting the purchase if you ever need to switch Classes. If your modem does not come from a manufacturer which actively supports it and has actual fax developers on staff, then purchasing it risks wasting it if you ever need firmware fixed. MultiTech is one of a VERY few number of analog modem manufacturers that actually have fax developers on staff which actively support their current modem line. You won't see their kind of fax support with 3Com-USR, that's for sure. When was the last time anyone from 3Com-USR mailed this list? (Hint: never)

I applaud Steve for caring enough about customer support to actually watch this mailing list. Shame on you for trying to abuse that.

Lee.

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