NNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!111!!!!

[azzachaz]

Last night in Canberra we had a huge electrical storm. A lightning bolt slammed down outside our house and must have blown up my ADSL modem because it is dead.

Luckly I have an external router/modem so my PC is OK. I checked the modem's PSU and that is working fine so the spike must have run up the phone line.

The modem has a small fuse inline with the phone jack but it is still intact.

Any suggestions on a good cheap modem? Any way of fixing my old one (common faults to look for)?

D'oh, this is going to come out of my iwaver fund :(

[James]

damn, thats carnage! i've had that happent to a $700 28.8k modem *back in the day*..

d-link or netcomm make cheap modems. billion i think do one under $100 too.

[azzachaz]

Yeah, I've ordered a Billion 5100.

Very basic but has built in firewall functions and a 4 port router which I actually found hady with my old one (Web Excel)

It was $96 delivered while the Web Excel was still at least $70 but no one had it in stock.

This will teach me to unplug the modem during storms. I could have brought an iWaver for $96 :(

[Matt]

i know this is an old thread, but hows the new modem going? billion seem to be getting a good go at the moment, im only hearing good things about them.

[cbo100]

I don't know what azzachaz has to say, but I have been running a Billion 5100W (the wireless version of the 5100) since I first got ADSL and they had just come out.

After an initial annoying period while their firmware was stuffed it has worked flawlessly, and even when it was stuffed, it was only stuffed for a week or so because they have some pretty decent support and released new firmware straight away - I think I actually got one of the first batch of Billion 5100s made, having serial number 836, which is why the firmware was a bit dodgy.

For the price I can't recommend Billion stuff highly enough, I know people who have paid hundreds more and ended up with nothing but trouble.

[azzachaz]

Yeah, been running the Billion for a week now. Not one problem so far.

You can tel the difference in quality between it and the Web Excel I used to have (although it was a good router too)

[Matt]

i use a linux box as a router, my adsl modem is juuuust a modem.