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From: shoemakerb on 6 Sep 2008 03:27
I bought a used C520 laptop. It works great, but I have a conflict
I'm having trouble with.

To make a long story short, I installed XP on a blank drive. The
network adapter works fine, but the internal modem, a PCTel, seems to
be OK, but there is a port conflict.

It supposedly uses COM3, and I get an error message telling me there
is already something using that port. However, there is no mention of
COM3 in the hardware manager.

When I try to tell the modem to use COM1 (which is listed) instead, I
get the same message: already in use.

I am confused. There is no other modem (as far as I know).

I had to get a generic driver from the company. Could this have
anything to do with it?

How can I configure this thing so it will work? I have another modem
on a PCMCIA card, but I'd rather used the installed one if I could.
Any ideas? Thanks.

Bill
From: William R. Walsh on 6 Sep 2008 09:49
Hi!

> It supposedly uses COM3

Most modern modems are "soft" modems and have only enough hardware to
connect to the telephone line. Everything else--including the serial
port assignment, happens in software.

> I had to get a generic driver from the company. Could this have
> anything to do with it?

Yes. Although it isn't common, some hardware makers do enough
customization that drivers from the actual chipset maker no longer
work. Dell has drivers for the PCTel modem in the Latitude C510.

The list of drivers for your system is here:
http://support.dell.com/support/downloads/driverslist.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=gen&ServiceTag=&SystemID=LAT_PNT_CEL_C510&os=WW1&osl=en&catid=&impid=
or (shortened): http://lnk.nu/support.dell.com/np1.aspx

The PCTel modem driver is here:
http://support.dell.com/support/downloads/download.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=gen&releaseid=R53654&SystemID=LAT_PNT_CEL_C510&servicetag=&os=WW1&osl=en&deviceid=1058&devlib=0&typecnt=0&vercnt=6&catid=-1&impid=-1&formatcnt=1&libid=20&fileid=63627
(shortened) http://lnk.nu/support.dell.com/np2.aspx

There was also seemingly a Conexant modem available for that system,
so you might want to make sure that you don't have that modem.

William
From: shoemakerb on 6 Sep 2008 21:14
Thank you very much!

I searched Dell a couple times, but somehow missed those pages.

i'll give those a try!

Bill


On Sep 6, 9:49 am, "William R. Walsh" <wm_wa...(a)hotmail.com> wrote:
> Hi!
>
> > It supposedly uses COM3
>
> Most modern modems are "soft" modems and have only enough hardware to
> connect to the telephone line. Everything else--including the serial
> port assignment, happens in software.
>
> > I had to get a generic driver from the company.  Could this have
> > anything to do with it?
>
> Yes. Although it isn't common, some hardware makers do enough
> customization that drivers from the actual chipset maker no longer
> work. Dell has drivers for the PCTel modem in the Latitude C510.
>
> The list of drivers for your system is here:http://support.dell.com/support/downloads/driverslist.aspx?c=us&l=en&...
> or (shortened):http://lnk.nu/support.dell.com/np1.aspx
>
> The PCTel modem driver is here:http://support.dell.com/support/downloads/download.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=g...
> (shortened)http://lnk.nu/support.dell.com/np2.aspx
>
> There was also seemingly a Conexant modem available for that system,
> so you might want to make sure that you don't have that modem.
>
> William

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