There really wasn't any good modem, IMHO, back then. They were all
painful to configure and make work reliably. Once the "net" revolution
started it still took years to get modems working reliably.
In '98 I know that the Max TNT was only getting about 85% call completion
across_the_board. Call completion only takes into account the completed
handshake. Then you dealt with code issues after you got them to at least
connect.
-M<