Driver, HSP and "plug and play" hell

[Mike McVey]

Dear KCLUG,

I have a "plug and play" SB 16  ISA sound card, USR 28.8 hardware 
(NOT "win") internal modem and NEC Super Script 860 printer--all of 
which I need to get talking to Linux.  

The modem will be easy, I hope. However, I had to fiddle like crazy 
with the thing to get Win 98 to recognize it, and who really knows 
what IRQ and address this thing is using. All I know is once I 
disabled the COM1 and COM2 serial ports in Windows device manager and 
pulled off all the jumpers it worked. When I put jumpers on it, so 
that Linux can use it, that match the address and IRQ (COM4)  that 
Windows sees it as, the thing doesn't work in Windows, but is in 
conflict. I hate plug and play now! What should I do?

Now for the sound card. I bet I will be in for a major struggle and 
may be better off getting rid of the loser for a new 10 dollar PCI 
unit. What do you think?

Now for the most perturbing thing of all:  I didn't just discover I 
have cancer, but something almost as bad:  My NEC Super Script 860 
laser printer is a "Winprinter." I had always thought that because it 
had its own separate microprocessor and memory (5 MB), it wasn't, but 
alas the manual says it uses "host based processing" as if this were 
a feature, but I know better. It is a huge defect and I was ripped 
off. For that and some other reasons, like the fact that it jams 
easily and is flimsy, I will never buy anything but an HP, ever 
again!  Does the Linux community or do manufacturers make drivers for 
Linux for any of these sorry HSP devices (winprinters and winmodems?)

Now for a bit of soapboxing: I wish host shared processing 
peripherals were banished from the face of the earth. When 
manufacturers are too cheap to put the extra 5 dollars of chips in a 
modem or printer to make it fully standalone and OS portable, it 
reveals their contempt for the consumer and collusion with the Wintel 
monopoly. I have always noticed that it can be hard to tell from the 
box if a modem is CPU killing, windows crashing piece of HSP junk or 
not--I guess that is the same with other devices too. 

Thanks for any insight.

Mike