Modems... we all use em (well, except you h0es on cable or ADSL.. or better), but most people overlook this essential piece of kit when budgetting (sp? hmm, where's that office paperclip when i need him) for a PC. PCs you buy in shops usually come with the cheapest of the cheap "software" modems. And whilst adequate for looking at pr0n on the internet, they lack performance if you wanna do anything else. Whilst you might not want to do anything else (and, quite frankly, that's fair enough), I'm still gonna explain why my powerhouse of a modem, the Diamond SupraExpress 56e Pro (image 1), can kick the crap out of your software modem and leave it for dead, so you might as well listen.

Software modems, as mentioned above, use a portion of your computer's processing power to do their job. What this means is that the modem has very little processing power of its own, and so if you have a slow PC, your modem's performance may be sluggish. Whilst this isn't a big problem if you're just surfing the web, if you're downloading big files you can expect your computer to be very sluggish, and if playing online computer games you're not going to have a very nice time of it. Since the modem and the game will be battling for processor power, your framerate is going to drop, and your "ping" (a measure of the speed of connection between you and the game server) will be very high, leading to lots of "lag" (interruptions in your game due to your computer and the server losing synchronisation) - making your internet game hard to play, and giving you a disadvantage compared to your opponents.

So lets take a look at the rather attractive little box shall we. Yes, "box", because this modem doesn't slot into your PC like most, it's an external (as opposed to internal) modem, and it plugs into one of your computer's serial ports. Obviously, it also needs to be connected to a phone line, and also plugs into a power socket (image 2). At the front of the box are a series of LEDs. These are quite useful, as they show you what the modem is up to (image 3). There's a light for "on" (surprisingly), one for upstream traffic (data being sent to the server), one for downstream (data you are receiving), and one to show that the modem is "off hook", i.e. is using the phone line. There's a few others... but, errrr, I don't know what they're for :D.

Right, for some ratings (everybody loves ratings):

1st up is price. Well, to be honest, you're gonna be hard pushed to FIND one of these modems. I think they have been phased out and replaced with inferior USB models. However, I might be wrong, and if you can find one expect to pay about £50 or £60. Yes, that's a lot huh. But if you enjoy playing CounterStrike, I expect your ping on 56k is about 180ish. My ping with this modem is 120, and has been 100. So I think it's worth the money, but since it's perhaps a bit much for some people, I'll give it a modest 4/5.

2nd we have performance. I measured my ping in Tactical Ops (a UT mod) and CounterStrike and DoD (Half life mods).

Motorola SM56 software modem
TO ping : 230
CS ping : 190
DoD ping : 185
Diamond SupraExpress 56e Pro
TO ping : 170
CS ping : 120
DoD ping : 120
All values are average, taken over a variety of servers at a variety of times. It was the same selection of servers and times for both modems, so a fairly decent comparison can be made.

Pretty good in my opinion :D You're not gonna get a better 56k performance than that.

3rd... umm, I'm running out of catagories. How about "looks". This is an external unit, so ur gonna see it everyday. So it's gotta look pretty snappy, and that it does :D. It's a nice bluey box, and the top is embossed with a large "DIAMOND" logo (image 4). It looks sweet atop my case, and is nice and small.

4th - thought of a good one - Support. As you may know, Diamond Multimedia is, and has long been, dead. However, on searching for drivers, I found new ones for win9x/ME, and also (surprisingly) for windows 2000. I'm not sure about XP support, but we can only wait. There was also updated firmware, but I don't think this modem is upgradable to v.92 (not a problem in my eyes, by the time ISPs move to this rather limited "upgraded" standard, we'll all have broadband anyway). So, another 4/5

Overall - ok, a 4... a 5... another 5, and a 4... hmm that's 4 and a half. Do I round up or down. Bah what the hell, I'm in a good mood...

The Diamond SupraExpress 56e Pro is, with no doubts, a marvellous modem which I can recommend to anyone not likely to be upgrading to cable or ADSL in the near future. It will improve your online performance, but not as much as an upgrade to such a broadband service. If you're a gamer and you have a software modem, all I can say is GET ONE OF THESE NOW! No, really. Go on. Go to the shops.

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