Communication errors usually arise in the script when your baud rate is too high and the modem is sending data too quickly via the serial port. You may need to change these setting to solve your communication errors.

If Winsock refuses to run the script or it will not connect at all, you may have to do what is called a PAP login. To perform a PAP login simply launch Winsock and press ESC if it starts to dial. Now select file and PPP.

Select PAP login and fill in your i12 dial-up username and password in the boxes in lowercase.

When you start to dial in, the login information will be provided from here. It may also ask you for your service. You will need to type PPP at the prompt and then it should tell you that you are connected.

If you get this message, it means that you have been restricted by your internal administrator from dialling the internet. You will need to get this restriction lifted before you attempt to connect again.

Help when your modem disconnects
The rather abrupt looking error message you receive when you are disconnected from the internet is not as frightening as it looks! All it means is that you probably have another ISP on your computer, such as CompuServe or AOL, and you have logged into them prior to trying to logging into your i12 account. All you need to do in most cases is simply reboot your machine and then try to login again. This will allow your modem to initialise and dial out.

You may also get an error message, which says that you have been disconnected from the computer you have dialled or the remote computer. This can be for a variety of reasons. It may be that you have installed new software and this has caused your settings to be lost. You will need to check that you have all the correct settings in your network icon in the control panel.

You may also need to check the quality of your telephone line with your telephone provider, as this can cause the line to drop as soon as you connect to the server.

Help with login problems
Most login problems occur because you may have typed your login username or password incorrectly. You have to make sure that they are typed in lowercase.

To check whether your login information is correct, you will need to load Winsock by double clicking on the icon in program manager. Media relations the ESC key if the modem starts to dial.

Now choose dialler and 1SETUP.cmd and you can now edit the telephone number, username and password.

Sometimes US Robotics modems cannot accept the standard ATZ command and so you have to edit the Trumpet Winsock script and remove the 'Z'.

To do this you need to double click on Winsock in program manager. Select dialler again and edit scripts and choose LOGIN.cmd.

The Winsock dialling script will now open up. Simply scroll through the lines of the script until you see a line, which says OUTPUT 30 ATZ, delete the 'Z' and your modem should start to dial.

Help with other modem problems
There can be several reasons why your modem fails to dial. Usually it is because there is a breakdown between the computer and the modem itself. This can be a hardware problem, like your modem cable is defective, or the modem is not properly connected to either the computer or the telephone connection. Of course, it may also be that your modem is broken. It may be able to send faxes, but to access the internet it actually uses another chip, so that could also be the problem. Let's try and find out.

To test whether your modem is communicating with your modem, all you need to do is double click on your Winsock icon. If the modem tries to dial then it is obviously working and you don't need to do anything else to see whether the modem is working.

If nothing happens, then you need to select the dialler, then select the manual login option from the Winsock menu.

The Trumpet Winsock screen will appear. If it allows you to type on it, type the letters ATZ and then click on enter. If it does not, it means that there may be a hardware problem and you will need to resolve that before you can try to connect. Another problem could be that you have an inappropriate initialisation string installed in your Winsock script. We'll look at that below.

If the response to the ATZ command when entered is "ok", then it means that the modem and computer are 'talking' to each other. This is a very good sign. You now need to tell the modem to dial out by typing in the command ATDT followed by the number of your i12 connection and then pressing the enter key. The modem should now start to dial i12. You should then be able to access the internet. If the modem doesn't dial out, this is likely to be a hardware problem. You need to check the modem cables, the modem itself and the telephone line. If when you have done this, everything seems to be fine, you need to listen for advice about modem initialisation strings.

If your modem dials and you appear to be connected to the internet, but no data transfers or the line drops after a few minutes, it may be because your initialisation string is incorrect or that your line quality is poor from your telephone company. An initialisation string is a line of code, which your modem sends to our modems to set it up correctly.

An initialisation string is a line of code, which your modem sends to ours to set it properly. You may or may not need one installed, but sometimes it helps improve your connection if you send the correct one to your modem. To install an initialisation string in Windows 3.1x, load Winsock by double clicking on the icon in program manager. If the modem tries to dial again, press the ESC key. Now you need to select the dialler option from the menu toolbar and then select the edit scripts option. .

You will now see another menu box. Select login.cmd from here and click on it and a notepad file will open on your screen.

You will see several lines of code. Scroll through the lines slowly, until you come to a line that has a dollar-sign and the word modemsetup ($modemsetup) contained in it. There will be several lines, which say this, but only one, which doesn't have a hash sign in front of it.

Any alterations you make must be made in lowercase. There are many different makes of modem available on the market but most obey the same commands. Some of the common ones and their default initialisation strings are below, but if you do not get any success with these, you will have to consult your user handbook or the modem manufacturer.

If you have a US Robotics modem, you can try changing the initialisation string to $modemsetup="&f1".

If you have a different type of modem try $modemsetup="&f". You can also try $modemsetup="&f&c1&d2&k3".

The baud rate is the speed at which your modem sends data to its serial port. If this is being transferred too quickly, the modem may just decide to stop transferring any data at all. Problems can also arise if the baud rate is invalid. For example, if it is totally incorrect. Sometimes to get a good connection, you have to lower this speed. If you need to change your baud rate to a lower speed, just double click on your Winsock icon in program manager, it may start to dial out. If it does, you can stop it by pressing the ESC key.

Now select the file and set up options out of the menu in the toolbar. The network configuration box will now open in front of you and the baud rate setting is just over half way down on the left-hand side.

If you have a 14.4k modem try the baud rate on 19200. If this is not successful change it down to 9600.

If you have a 28.8k modem try the baud rate on 57600. If this is not successful change it down to 38400.

If you have a 33.6k or 56k modem try the baud rate on 115200. If this does not work change it down to 57600.

This is a common problem and it is usually easily rectified. The no carrier message means that the modem thinks the line is already busy. This can be caused if you have your modem plugged into a splitter switch, with your telephone plugged into the other side of the socket. The modem thinks that the telephone is already using the line, so all you need to do is disconnect the phone when you are using your modem to access the internet.

The no carrier error often also appears when you have your modem on an extension cable. In certain cases, you will need to get your modem plugged directly into the phone socket to achieve a successful connection.

Quite often when people have only one phone line, they plug their fax machine into a splitter switch, with their modem. The modem again thinks that the line is busy and that it cannot dial out. You will have to disconnect your fax machine while you are trying to dial in to the internet.

This can be because your modem is trying to run a trace to things like the DNS of the server you are connecting to, it is quite easy to turn this off. All you need to do is launch Winsock in program manager and press ESC if it starts to try and dial out. In the toolbar menu, you will see the word trace. When you select it, a drop down menu will appear with lots of options on it, all you need to do is remove the ticks from all of the options and the problem may disappear.