alright... deep breaths....
okay... here's the deal... i got this broadxent modem thing that needs a driver. one of the fine people on this forum helped me find the driver. it seems to install fine. now i got 2 sets of instructions for this driver. one is the set that came with the driver. (used for a different version of linux- mandrake i think) the other is by a knoppix user who got it to work on there computer. i followed the original instructions which ( in the end) tell me to go to minicom after installing it and dail out from there... it dials but nothing happens. SO- i then went to the second set of instructions that tell me after installing it (which i did) to type 'pppd call isp nodetach' i do that and get and error saying 'etc/peers/isp (or something or other)' doesn't exists. i'm think that if i do the pppd stuff i need to set up something- i have no clue how to do that because i haven't the slightest clue what i'm doing. i do 'info pppd' and get lots of stuff that i frankly don't understand. this is probably extremely simple... i'm sooo lost. can anyone help? driver w/ knoppix instructions here......
http://linmodems.technion.ac.il/arch.../msg00316.html
p.s. i'm running from the CD

Samsung 2.5" 870 EVO SSD SATA III 250GB 500GB 1TB Internet Solid State Drive Lot
$60.00
External SSD 1TB 2TB 4TB Portable Hard Drive USB 3.0 Type-C High Speed PC Mac
$19.99
Dell Latitude 14" Laptop Computer Intel i5 Up To 32GB RAM 1TB SSD Windows 11 Pro
$545.25
Dell Latitude 14" Laptop Computer Intel i7 Up To 32GB RAM 1TB SSD Windows 11 Pro
$330.73
1TB Kingston DataTraveler Max DTMAX/1TB USB Type-C Flash Drive
$86.95
Crucial MX500 1TB 2.5" SATA III Internal SSD CT1000MX500SSD1
$99.99
Acer Predator Helios Neo 16S AI 16" i9 275HX 2S RTX 5070 Ti 32GB 1TB SSD Refurb
$1746.47
SAMSUNG T7 Portable SSD 1TB Indigo Blue USB 3.2 Gen2 External MU-PC1T0H/AM
$159.99
Seagate Desktop 1TB/1000GB SATA 3.5" HDD Hard Drive
$29.99
External Solid State Drive USB 3.2 Gen2, 1TB SSD External Hard Drive with C to A
$100.00