I debated whether this question is better posed here, or in the installation section, or in the general questions section. There are two (related) aspects to this question. I attempted to find the answer by inserting the terms "modem recognition" into the search engine on the forum, without success.
Yes, it is a modem problem. In a nutshell, from previous attempts, (all futile), over the past decade, I know that all of my half dozen dialup 56k modems are unrecognized by Linux, THEREFORE, I purchased, a new modem, last year, to use with Core 5, which I finally got around to installing yesterday. The modem is BEST DATA V.92. It is an EXTERNAL modem that connects via the old fashioned serial port cable, much beloved by Linux.
PROBLEM 1. Fedora installs beautifully, almost dare I say, EFFORTLESSLY, but for the annoyance of requiring various passwords and users, etc. However, there is no MODEM in the list of devices. The operating system acts as though it is not connected. I received numerous prompts to test my "sound card" (there is none, the audio chip set is integrated), but nothing to help in configuring the "non-existant" modem. I tried to find a method to access the serial port, or adjust it, or confirm the presence or absence of a problem with the modem, (--which works perfectly with both win98SE, and winXP(--the GRUB loader is excellent!!!) so I know the problem is not with the modem itself.)
PROBLEM 2. (Maybe this is really, the main problem: ) In attempting to find out why the operating system does not recognize the modem, I endeavored to locate a link or drop down menu to "hardware", and found none. I found "system", and various other possible alternatives, but nothing comparable to M$ Win98SE System Control Panel, which lists EVERY device, and indicates need for adjustment or repair. WHY? or WHY NOT?
When I sought "help", I typed in "modem installation" in the recently installed Fedora 5 help engine, and received zero information. Is it just me, or is this situation genuinely counterintuitive? By now, with Core 5, shouldn't this be a tad easier? I had this kind of trouble ten years ago, with the Infosys Linux distribution, from 1995...The computer hardware is 4 years old, i.e. not the most recent, but works well with other operating systems. I purchased another three distributions, KUBUNTU, SUSE, and MANDRIVA. Alas, none of them worked better, than Fedora Core 5, and some of them were even unstable. None of them recognized the modem. None of them offered any help on "modem recognition" in the installed Help search engine, and none of them offered a drop down menu corresponding to the Win98SE "Control Panel". Perhaps I expect too much--since other features of the operating system seem quite excellent, games, etc...? I would like to connect to the internet, and that is why I purchased this external modem, at a cost five times that of my "normal" internal modems, all of which work fine with M$, but are unknown entities in the Linux world. I know that this expensive modem works very well with my Internet service provider, but how can I interact with Fedora 5 so that it will recognize this external, serial port based, modem? Thanks for your suggestions.