modem keeps switching ports

[giltheissen]

I just happened to notice that my modem (internal PCI, lucent chip)switches COM ports every time I reboot (hard or soft). It flips back and forth between COM 2 and COM3 with every boot. I'm running Win 98SE and no recently added hardware or software and nothing else on any of my other COM ports. It doesn't interfere with IE dialouts but it does require me to manually reset my com ports whenever I use another piece of software (WestLaw) that also uses the phone lines.
I probably never would have noticed this flip-flopping were it not for the fact that I started having trouble dialing out with this other software and when I started troubleshooting, I happened to notice it was set for COM3 but my modem was COM2. I reset the software to COM2, but then the next day it wouldn't dial out again. Checked again and saw that my modem had switched again to COM3. That's when I discovered it was switching with every single boot.
Sure like to know what's causing it and how to make it stop.
Thanks --Gil Theissen

[Jimstep]

Sounds like there may be another device conflict that sometimes grabs a resource before the modem does. I prefer external modems due to their ability to offload some functions from the processor.