Introduction
Modem history
The first modems were developed in the 1950s, when the North American Air
Defense needed to transmit military data. Efforts were made in order to achieve
that goal by transmitting the data on the existing telephone lines.
In the late 50s, the Air Defense was already using modems, although the first
commercial modem entered the communication market only in 1962. It was invented
by AT&T and was called Bell 103. This "innovative" device was a dial-up modem
(transmits data on regular phone lines), enabled full-duplex transmission and
reached data rates of 300 bps (bits per seconds).
As years passed, dial-up modems' technology improved and the data rates were increased. In 1980 data rates reached 14.4 Kbps, and in 1994 it was doubled to 28.8 Kbps. In 1996 a new technology emerged, enabling data rate of 56 Kbps, which is still the fastest speed that exists today for dial-up modems.
New technologies emerged in the late 1990s, and improved significantly the modems available speed. These technologies, such as ADSL that works on telephone lines, and cables modems that work on the TV cables, are called "broadband modems", and enable connection speed that is ~10-200 times faster than the old dial-up connection.
Introduction
Modem history