Modem Pooling

Work has a shared modem pool hosted on an NT 4 server. The win98/se boxes can connect just fine through \DOMAINSERVERmodem. But we've gotten some new XP Pro boxes now. Does anyone know of any good, free/cheap COM Port Redirectors that will run on XP?

-Tim

An update: Matt suggested I try net use.

I tried "net use com1: \MAINSERVERModem" but it returned Error 66, The network resource type is not correct.

I did some more research and found the \MAINSERVER is running NT4 and using SAPS by SpartaCom to manage the pool. I visited their website (www.spartacom.com) but wasn't too impressed.

They're now known as Converging Technologies Inc.--a "new name but the same great products." Possible buy out?

Anyway, their site said SAPS is not compatible with WinXP and I need to "contact SpartaCom Sales for upgrade information."

I guess the question now would be are there any recommended modem pooling servers?

-Tim

I have the same problem - Upgrading from SBS2000 to SBS2003 which no longer includes the modem sharing service.

Can anyone suggest a good alternative?

-Chris

Microsoft removed the NetModem Modem Sharing service from SBS2003 because it was a security issue. Anyone on the network could simply install a TCP packet sniffer such as Ethereal.net which allows them to see any and all data being passed through the shared modem connections.

It would be very easy for a hacker to capture complete sessions including the dialup users login/password information, and other sensitive data.

The current version of the NetModem Modem Server service supports SSL encryption to prevent the modem pooling streams from being captured. NetModem is no longer included with SBS2003 or later, but it is available as a seperate package at netmodem.com

There have been a number of other security enhancments added since the SBS2000 version, including user authentication, and the ability log all the activity as well as phone numbers being dialed to a MS SQL Server (or MySQL) database.

Dhak

Also, to answer the original question by BluePhoenix, the NetModem Client redirector is free, which is bundled with the NetModem modem pooling server.

NetModem Client works with 2000, XP and Vista (both 32-bit and 64-bit versions), which creates up to 256 virtual COM ports that can each be redirected to different modem servers.

Dhak