A Beginners Review of Maestro's 144FM Fax Modem by Steven Ruttley  ¿? 35 ¿*? 35 ¿*? 35 ¿*? 35 ¿*? 35 ¿*? 35 ¿*? 35 ¿*? 35 ¿*? 35 ¿*? 35 ¿? Introduction I have recently had the pleasure of entering the world of telecommunications when I purchased Maestro's new "Executive series" 144FM Fax Modem from Megadisc.I have an Amiga 3000 and wanted to have access to the grapevine so I needed to buy a modem (obviously). I had no previous experience whatsoever with modems so I would like to emphasise that this is written from the viewpoint of a complete novice. My introduction was when I started looking around at what was available and what they could do. I knew that a higher baud rate was better without really knowing why. I was after fax capabilities if it wasn't going to cost the earth and I thought that if fax ran at 9600 baud then the data side should as well and 2400 sounded very slow in comparison. I went to Tim Strachan the editor of Megadisc, a very good disk magazine for the amiga. He told me that Maestro was good value for money but that their fax/data modem was 2400 baud for data. He thought they were bringing out a new model and would get back to me. Shortly after I got a call back with the news that a 14400 baud modem in both fax and data was on its way for the same price as the old 2400 data model. My lucky day! The only catch was that the production line wasn't quite ready and there were some back orders so it might take a month to six weeks to deliver. I didn't need it for anything straight away (except fun) so why not. The saga Order me one and I'll try and learn something about this world of V.32 bis,parity and AT commands in the meantime. I spent the time learning as much as I could about comms and terminal programs as I could without actually being able to experiment and waited. The weeks went by and nothing was heard from Maestro. I annoyed Tim on the phone and he patiently kept getting in touch with Maestro to find out what was happening. Maestro reminded me very much of my dealings with Commodore during this period. Vague answers from the sales staff and a seeming lack of the right hand knowing what the left is doing. After weeks of frustration at being told that it was coming soon or it was on its way we got down to "It was sent yesterday and should be there tomorrow". This went on for a week during which time Tim must have been pulling his hair out trying to deal with my phone calls instead of getting MD34 ready and preparing for the WOC show that was coming up. The Review Finally 1 day short of 3 months from ordering an express post package arrived. Upon opening I found all the bits and pieces that make up a modem set. The telephone cable comes with a standard telecom plug so it goes straight into a telecom outlet. Even more importantly the modem is fully telecom approved so you aren't breaking the law. A Serial cable is not included unless you specifically order one. The modem itself is stylishly presented in a low black metal housing that now sits proudly to the right of my monitor, behind the mouse pad where I can see the various mode lights going on and off as if it belonged on the Enterprise instead of in my study. Also in the box was a power lead with a transformer and a manual. Under everything I found a flat ziplock plastic bag with a disc and the manual to V2.21 of GP Fax in it. (Fax software is supplied for the particular platform that the modem is to be used on apparently) This alone saves a good deal of money and makes the whole package even better value. As to setting the modem up it is all very straight forward and obvious from a hardware point of view so I had the lights flashing in no time. I ran N.Comm1.92 (an amiga PD terminal program) and it recognised the modem without problems. So far so good. At this stage I thought some advice from the manual might be in order. I had read through it to start with but it didn't seem to make much sense without the whole thing sitting in front of me with power running through it. However this time it didn't seem to make much sense with power running through it. The manual consists of a lot of technical information on protocols, AT commands and S registers and not much of it seemed to be in English. Now that I am getting used to the whole deal I find the information to be very helpful and makes changing the setup of the modem quite straight forward. Not wanting to look like a complete idiot the first time I called a BBS I played around in N.Comm and found out how to read the values of the S register. Deciding to leave well enough alone, I left the settings at the default values and thought about trying to send a fax. I called a friend with a fax machine handy, sent one over and got him to send one back. Everything worked beautifully without a hitch. I finally felt confident enough to call a BBS and hunted around for a public board. I found an amiga based board in a BBS listing I had and dialled away. Again no problems, in fact a message with "connect speed 19200" appeared. I had a browse through the board and managed not to do any damage then spent the next few minutes trying to work out how to exit the system. I eventually worked it out but I am glad this first call wasn't STD. I have since made many calls and have made transfer rates up to 1700 bps when downloading files using 8 colour workbench screen. It has been taking around 50 sec to 1 min to download an 80000 bit file. The Conclusion I have found this modem to be fast and efficient and has opened a new world of computing to me. I wish that the documentation had a little more beginners' support in it but ultimately this did not stop me getting connected very quickly. GP Fax is terrific and for $599 + $15 for the serial cable (with the subscribers discount from Megadisc) I feel that it has been money well spent. After the initial frustration of Maestro's lack of consumer support I couldn't be happier with their product.  ¿? 35 ¿*? 35 ¿*? 35 ¿*? 35 ¿*? 35 ¿*? 35 ¿*? 35 ¿*? 35 ¿*? 35 ¿*? 35 ¿?