Message: Opencomm-Couldn't open port

[Paz]

[Daz]

you probably know more than i do about this  but forgive me if this sounds totaly stupid but check the device manager and see if the ports have any drivers that are causing conflicts...id get rid of them if they are then reinstall the modem drivers again...

[loomex]

That was going to be my advice. Turn off, remove modem if its not  part of the motherboard. Reboot. look for any drivers that deal with the modem and remove those. Reboot, after reboot turn off agian, reinstall the modem, turn the puter on, should tell you that there is some new toy added. Just follow the new hardware wizard. You might have to have the factory disk with you, also try looking for updated drivers for the modem.

Thats what I would do at least

Chris

[Smoke2much]

Where's the darned beer?

[Paz]

Where's the darned beer?

 I'm sorry Will, but no one is getting any beer until we get this fellows computer working correctly again.

check the device manager and see if the ports have any drivers that are causing conflicts...id get rid of them if they are then reinstall the modem drivers again...  

 Good suggestion Daz, but I've already been that route and there are no errors showing in the device manager, as a matter of fact, at first it was not even showing a COM port in the device manager.

Turn off, remove modem if its not  part of the motherboard. Reboot. look for any drivers that deal with the modem and remove those. Reboot, after reboot turn off agian, reinstall the modem, turn the puter on, should tell you that there is some new toy added. Just follow the new hardware wizard. You might have to have the factory disk with you, also try looking for updated drivers for the modem.

 I do have the install disc for the modem, because that was one of the things I was thinking I may have to do (re-install modem).


 Here's the latest clue to this mystery:
 Last night I went into MSCONFIG and turned off everything but the very basic functions and restarted the PC, now the COM port shows up in the device manager, however, now when I go into the modem diagnostics and click on the 'more info' button, I get a new error that says "Modem not responding, verify correct interupt is set for port".

 Here's what we have showing:
Port: 1
Interupt: 4
Address: 3F8
UART: NS 16550AN

Standard 56000 bps V90 Modem
Identifier: USRK2_Gen

 This morning I am going to try a few things, I am going to move the modem to a different PCI slot, and I am also going to remove the modem and try re-installing it.
 If none of that helps, I may take a modem out of one of my other machines and see if I can get that to work, if it does, then I will be thinking his modem is bad.

 Keep the ideas coming, I'm keeping that beer on ice until I can sign on to the internet with my friends computer.

[Daz]

oh the interupts.... not sure how to check these but on win98 no 2 things should have the same interupt.. fine on xp coz its magic or something bu win98 beefs about it...had same problem with my old comp and wouldnt accept my graphics card because it had same interupt as the friggin mouse! somewhere in bios it should have interupt change and on bootup you should see the IRQ for everything... jsut a suggestion i dont even know how to change them

[Wing Nut]

GIVE ME BEER OR EVERY POST YOU MAKE FOR A MONTH WILL BE DELETED! ]

[Paz]

 Things are much worse now, I had the restore disc so I went ahead and restored Win98 hoping to reset everything and resolve the issue with the interupts and com port and all, unfortunetly I do not have the authentication number to enter so I can fire windows back up again.
 Is there a way around this? I sure hope my friend has the paperwork for this machine, remember, he bought it second hand as well, this could be disasterous if I can't come up with the proper number to start windows again.

[Daz]

ooh not pretty to lost the serial numbers.....i know what my mind is saying but im not gonna even suggest doing anything ilegal on these forums to get around it

[RollerBall]

1. Forget the restore disk. These are generally a complete waste of space.

2. You could try just booting to DOS with the Win98 startup disk and reinstalliing Windows.

3. Sounds to me as though your buddy was running without 'protection' on the Internet and picked up a trojan dialler (comes from poking round rather less than salubrious sites usually!

4. If you haven't got any anti-trojan ware (chance is you haven't because I've looked and there ain't no free stuff out there) best thing is to do a DIR of the windows \system and \system32 folders looking for any exe files with recent dates. If there are any, they shouldn't be there - delete them and usually you've killed the bug.

5. Then even better use Regedit to try to find the entries the b*st*rd put in your registry. My recent posting in the Software section tells you where to look.

Trouble is, it sounds as though it could now be all too late.....

[Paz]

 HAHA!! Paz prevails!
 I am typing this from the computer we thought was a complete loss.
 Once I return to my machine there will be a round for everyone who tried to help.

 Here's the scenario:
 I ask my friend today at work if he has the document for the OS, naturally and just as I expected he says "no", but his woman had contacted Microsoft and received a new Key code.
 So when I got home I called them and got the code, which did not work....
so, I called Microsoft and got yet another key code, which did work!
 I let Win98 do it's thing, re-installed all the drivers and now everything is working fine.

 I'm not sure what happened, they installed a new modem and I don't know what they did wrong, but the computer was no longer able to communicate with COM1, now, there is nothing on the COM1 port and windows automatically installed the modem to COM4, and everything is working fine.

 I should do them a favor and install zone alarm on here while I have it in my possession.
Yes, I think I will keep it another night and follow Rollerballs advice and check for any kind of mischief that may have caused the problems in the first place.

 Thanks everyone for your ideas, I love it when I get peoples PC's working for them, I wish I could do this for a living.

[Paz]

 Back on my machine and as promised, here you go:


 Thanks!

[RollerBall]

Thanks Paz - I'm totally underoverwhelmed by that magnificent gesture....