Modemsite's Forum56 - The Modem Board Main | profile | register | search | help | Ad-free Login

Author

Topic

Judd Tl Posts: 1 USA

Posted - 1/18/2004 7:56:49 AM       After two days of research I matched hardware ID's and discovered that the older BCM 4211, aka BCM V.90 56K, can be upgraded to V.92. Now before I explain this I want everyone reading this to know that I am an IT student working towards a network specialist degree, so my knowledge base may be a little advance for the average user. Bearing that in mind, here's what I did to "flash" the older modem to a much faster V.92 driver. Not much is documented about the BCM modem to begin with. I must give thanks to modemsite.com for setting me off in the right direction. What you have to consider when upgrading a modem of this type, one with hardly any references or support from the manufacture, is whether or not the chipset was used in newer versions of the modem. Luckily Gateway continued using this chipset for bundled PC's. So naturally if the driver version is V.92, then the older could be upgraded to the same. But you have to be careful because there are a couple versions of this driver available. Version 3.4.16 and 3.4.22. After researching I discovered that since my modem's driver was originally calibrated for WindowsMe, I would need to see if a V.92 modem was provided by Gateway for WinMe. To my surprise it was, I then matched chipsets and hardware ID's. The first set of numbers in the ID is the same for both V.90 and V.92, PCI/VEN_14E4&DEV_4212... The key is the number 4212. This is the chipset ID. The older V.90 uses that same chipset. So matching that was step one. Step two involved looking at the driver upgrade releases at Gateway's support site. Driver 3.4.16 was released for WinMe but also released for WinXP, while 3.4.22 was released exclusively for Win2000/XP. That again reaffirmed the matching chipsets. So I downloaded the 3.4.16 and created a new restore point before attempting the upgrade. I then restarted the computer to wipe the RAM, and installed the new driver. The install went perfectly. No conflicts, as I assumed. I then checked device manager to insure compatibility and config options and all was well. I restarted the computer, logged onto my ISP, and immediately connected at 50.6kbps. Before my max connect was 49.2, not bad considering the modems reputation. I've no problem since, besides an occasional drop-off. These results will vary depending of your phone lines and such. In conclusion, it pays to do a bit of research before you go and spend more $$$!! Good luck!!!

Click Here To Close Thread, Administrators & Moderators Only.

Show All Forums |