Reinstalling Windows is a bad mistake to make. It can only make things worse.

It wipes out all your system hardware, and all your installed programs. These must 
all be re-installed after the re-install of Windows, which means a nightmare of lost 
and missing installation disks, CDs, and serial numbers.


Modem faults must be tackled in the following way:

1. Switch off the machine and unplug the modem PCI card from the computer. OBSERVE 
the proper precautions to avoid static damage to the computer and to the PCI card:

 http://www.annoyances.org/exec/forum/winme/1177076589

2. Restart the computer in Safe Mode (press F5 during startup). Open the Device Manager, 
and delete the modem from the list of devices:

 START > SETTINGS > CONTROL PANEL > SYSTEM > DEVICE MANAGER

Also delete any other modem entries seen in Device Manager.

3. Restart the computer normally. Check in Device Manager, and delete any device 
entries there that show as faulty (i.e. any that have an exclamation mark or question 
mark against them). If you have deleted any entry(s), shutdown normally and restart 
the computer.

4. Next, install the modem program from the modem installation CD.

5. Switch off the computer. Plug in the PCI card, taking proper anti-static precautions:

 http://www.annoyances.org/exec/forum/winme/1177076589

6. Restart normally. Windows will detect the PCI card during startup, and reinstall 
the correct drivers. Have the original modem driver CD to hand in this step too, 
just in case, but in fact it should not be needed.


If the above does not solve the problem, please reconsider your original post, and 
give a clearer explanation of the problem. For example, what does the phrase "it 
will not break dial-tone" actually mean?


Ed







On Sunday, April 15, 2007 at 3:52 pm, rholiday wrote:

>While attempting to reinstall ME off a restore CD I went to install the internal 

>modem that came with the computer.  It appeared that it installed making mention 

>of a speaker phone modem, but it will not break dial-tone.  The method I used to 

>install the modem was by going through add/remove hardware and letting it auto-detect 

>the drivers on the driver cd from Dell.  Now while trying to use the setup application 

>on the cd to re-install the drivers the install program crashes when you click to 

>install the drivers.  Same when you try to test the modem via the same setup application. 

> Any recommendations out there? 

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