Open Hardware ADSL, Linux Friendly

[Vincent Trouilliez]

On Sat, 2005-06-11 at 17:45 -0400, Walter Tautz wrote:
> Just wondering if people could give some recommendations
> on ADSL modems that have an open design, or at the very
> least are easy to use with linux. Some of these devices
> seem to have quite a bit of stuff in them so I was
> wondering if there are any that are "accessible", configurable?

I have had 3 broadband modems so far, some ADSL, some cable. Never got
to chose, they were given by my ISP, who of course don't provide any
support of any kind, for Linux fans.
Still, they all worked out of the box with Linux. For ADSL modems, all I
had to do was to run "pppoeconf" at the command line in a terminal, and
20 seconds later you are ready to go, it will detect your network cards,
select the one connected to your modem, enter log-in and password and
that's it ! :o)
Recently I switched from ADSL to Cable... even easier. About as easy as
you can get : start the computer, and it works automagically ! Didn't
even need to enter my log-in or password.... I understand it's something
to do with "DHCP" magic. Whatever it is, I love it ! :-)
The only thing I make sure of, was to chose a modem with an Ethernet/LAN
interface, not USB. But at least around here, it seems that most ISPs
now suply modems that have both USB and Ethernet interfaces at the same
time, they aren't separate devices anymore, so you don't have to chose,
just take their modem, plug a LAN cable and off you go ! :o)

So my guess is that as long as you don't buy some dirty
cheap/crap/obscure modem, and make sure it has Ethernet facility, it's
likely that they will all work out of the box painlessly, unless they
explicitly state otherwise on the tin, for some reason.

HTH


--
Vince, loves DHCP magic...