Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)Apparently, there is an "A" model version of this USR modem for $20 cheaper but which received rather poor reviews so note that this is the USR "B" model or USR5633B. I am very pleased with its performance. My saga in brief: due to geographics but by choice I'm in a very rural area, the cable folks or indeed the telephone high speed DSL internet service is just not available and satellite internet is still prohibitively expensive so basically I am reduced to a regional dial-up ISP for internet service. The phone company says they are "working on it in your dialing area" with regard to DSL high-speed internet service but no need to tell you that this was almost 2 years ago and I assume they are still working on it! Rural areas are not exactly a priority it would seem!
Anyway, my dial-up problems with my old USB modem were two-fold: chronic hang-ups or, even more frustrating if you've been this route, the thing would connect to the ISP but as soon as you want go to to another website after some time went by or go wherever on the internet or usenet, the old "can't find (whatever)" would pop up even though still connected! Figure that one out! Talk about frustration! Worse, with the old modem, any internet connection over 38 K/BPS would generally result in a hang-up within a half hour!
With this new USR modem, the 5633B, great! First connection after installing it [USB with its own disk software] was 45.2 K/BPS and it stayed that way for over 10 hours of usage! Today, as an example, the connect speed was/is 42.6 K/BPS and no problems and I've been connected for over 8 hours now! So too and thus far, no hang-ups at all or "can't find" [various websites] gremlins and I find the overall speed quite good for a dial-up connection.
Two things tho' -- make sure you take out in Windows your present modem driver BEFORE installing the USR modem AND if you use any programs like Norton's "Ghost" or similar snapshot recovery software, you may have a problem when the recovery software senses that a major component is being changed and so you 'may' get the message "The modem can not be connected to Windows" which is generally a conflict with those kinds of 'protective' data and component 'snapshot' recovery programs that back-up your hard-drive and everything on it 'automatically' which 'sometimes' can be more trouble than they are worth! Or certain cheap or 'freebie' "recovery" programs that quite ironically [when you-know-what hits the fan] suddenly inform you that they require being in Windows to perform a recovery! Hey, if one can't even 'get' into Windows in the event of a serious blue or black screen glitch, what good are such alleged 'recovery' programs that 'require' Windows to 'do' a system recovery!
Anyway, so far so good with the USR5633B modem. Watch which one you order and note that this one is the more expensive "B" model and NOT the cheaper "A" model!
Doc Tony
Click Here to see more reviews about:
USRobotics 56K V.92 Faxmodem USB ( 5633B )
Click here for more information about USRobotics 56K V.92 Faxmodem USB ( 5633B )
