COM 1 in Device Manager - dialing up COM 3

[wildredhead]

I may have the toughest question of the day.  I'm not very computer literate and will try to pose my problem in a way it makes sense so that I may get some help.  Our ISP is a dial-up service; worked fine on Monday.  However, last night dial-up says something to the effect that com port 3 is already in use or not working properly.  When I checked the ports in the device manager, it shows only com port 1 and that it is working properly.  Since I am not writing from my home pc for obvious reasons, if anyone can help me or needs more info to help... PLEASE... I'll do what I can.  Thanks!

P.S.  Am using an emachine with Windows XP on it.

[royphil345]

Hmmm... I imagine you tried restarting the computer?   What happens if you go to my computer / control panel  / printers and other hardware / phone and modem options.... Click on the modem tab, highlight your modem click on properties. Click the diagnostics tab and the query modem button.  If the computer is able to communicate with the modem, it may be an issue with your dial-up software (uninstall and reinstall or delete your dial-up connection and try creating a new one). Do you use a manually configured dial-up connection or your ISPs dial-up software from a disk or download? If the computer is unable to communicate with the modem... Might try uninstalling the modem in the device manager and reinstalling it after a restart.

[wildredhead]

I did try and restart the computer - even did the thing that allows me to go back to an earlier restore and that didn't work.  It has been a while, but I don't think my dial-up connection was done by disk or download - I believe I manually installed it.  I didn't query the modem button, but I did query the "port" one and it said the device (COM port 1) was working correctly; however, the problem when I try and dial up is showing COM port 3 is busy.  When I get home, I will try both of your suggestions - query the modem and delete and re-install my dial-up information.

Thank you!

[pcdoc4christ]

Wild:

COM 1 and COM 3 use the same IRQ.  (That's geek speak for you whatever device is using communication port number one is keeping your modem from working.)  What is using COM 1?

Best regards,
Doc