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On Wednesday, I spoke to Brian McWilliams of PC World News Radio about possible delays in the ITU 56K standard (see Friday's news). Brian has an article today in PC World, including a snippet of our conversation.
Computer Retail News reports on a $99 Zoom internal K56flex modem, and Zoom's modem and video camera bundle.
Firmware updates
Diamond Multimedia has a 1.000-03 firmware update for the SupraExpress 56. The same page has a firmware downgrade to 0.519 if the upgrade causes problems with your ISP.
I've added Garnet to the firmware updates and inits and drivers pages. Doug McClure writes:
I just bought a Garnet GTM-56KSPC4 K56flex modem this weekend and it came with .519. I called their tech support and got the flash and flash utility to go to 1.002. Their WWW site is www.minci.com. I've gotten 46k-52k connects to our PM3's. Great (and cheap) modem.
Jeff Wolf of Bay Networks sent us a followup to his Wednesday email.
Thanks for publishing my email regarding Bay Network's 56K modem solutions. I did make a small error, however. We will be releasing our x2 upgrade during the first week in November instead of the end of October as I had said. It's only a few days, but I wanted to be accurate.
Capital FM, a UK radio station, is giving away U.S. Robotics x2 modems.
Firmware updates
Zoom has a V1.002a firmware update.
Hayes has new beta firmware for the Hayes Accura.
In response to Friday's article about the USR firmware update for 25 MHz Couriers, Rick McBride notes that there is also an upgrade for the 20 MHz Couriers at ftp://ftp.usr.com/pub/usr/dl05/. The 20 MHz version is usrsdl.exe. The 25 MHz version is usrsdl25.exe. To find out which chip your Courier has, type ATI7 in a terminal program.
New PCMCIA cards
Motorola's new MobileSURFR 56K supports cellular direct and is compatible with Windows CE devices. It has an estimated street price of $199.
The DATA RACE WinMAX56SP offers full-duplex speakerphone and videoconferencing with a headset for privacy.
The $189 E-Tech Bullet C56KRX is an upgradeable K56flex PCMCIA modem.
Bay Networks upgrades
Jeff Wolf, Product Manager for Bay Networks, writes:
In your modem software upgrade section you mention that Bay will be providing K56Flex software for free. That's true, but you fail to mention that we will ALSO be supplying x2 software for free as well.
We are the only central site manufacturer to support BOTH 56K technologies on our 5399RAC and 8000 Remote Access Concentrators.
Since our product is based upon a TI DSP (not quite the same one as USR), we enjoy the flexibility of providing our customers with a choice. Our 5000MSX chassis can, therefore, include 5399 blades (boards) for either or both technologies (yes, both in the same chassis).
We expect to release x2 by the end of October, and K56Flex during the first week of December. We do NOT use USR's or Rockwell's chips or code, but are implementing these standards ourselves under license from USR/3Com and Rockwell/Lucent.
56K.COM is written and maintained by Les Jones. Artwork by Mark Maxwell. Copyright 1997 Softwords.
