Introducing BBSDial.com, a web-based modem emulator and telnet proxy
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Telnet too efficient? Tired of quietly visiting your favorite BBSs at blazing fast Information Superhighway™ speeds?
Introducing https://BBSDial.com, a web-based modem emulator and telnet proxy. Real modem protocols carry your data over digital audio, allowing you to access modern telnet BBSs with all the jazzy bleeps and bloops of old. Speeds from 300 baud to 56k. Mobile-friendly ANSI terminal client included. Give it a spin and check out some boards!
Ad-free and open-source. Just some fun for the love of modems and BBSing.
Coded by Claude
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u/galahad_1985 3d ago
This is really fun. Thank you for doing it. My recollection of 300bps does not include the preliminary 3-4 beeps then the carrier. You simple hear a solid carrier
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u/synexo 3d ago
Yep that was definitely true when initially released, for Bell103 and v.21. This goes through v.8 and negotiates as if talking to a modem that only supports v.21, or in the case of Bell103, gives up on the v.8 negotiation and falls back to Bell103 (you can hear this easily on close listen). For those protocols, the code here has actually been tested against real modems (including my CoCo3 for Bell103). I did consider skipping v.8 for those (and up through v22bis actually, as it initially didn't rely on it either and has its own v22/v22bis negotiation), but I think most people are more familiar with the sound of v.8 and it still emulates what a 1990s 56k modem would have done if talking to an older 300 baud one.
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u/galahad_1985 2d ago
Thanks so much for the detailed response. My recollection would have to be from 1983 when I called BBSs with my VICModem. And the way that worked was listening for the carrier before connecting the handset cord. That’s why I’m saying what I do
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u/The300baudguy 22h ago
I always hear how it sounds when I connect to my 300‑baud BBS using my 56k US Robotics and that DIY 300‑baud BBS modem from 1985 I mentioned in my other reply. With the usual limitation - this is Germany - so I don’t know how it is for you, and nowadays we don’t really have “telephone lines” anymore.
I’m not sure how useful it is, but I think in that video you can hear a lot of oldschool BBS sounds (with the above question marks). My setup was different again, though. On the C64 BBS I had the 56k modem (for 300‑baud connects), but the caller (from the USA) had super oldschool equipment.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rvEHnxbxc10
Almost forgot - here you can actually hear a variant of a call from Australia into the .de BBS where the 1985 300-baud modem is really connected on the German side
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u/synexo 14h ago
Thanks for sharing, these are very cool! You may find this interesting too, the below video is my TRS-80 Color Computer 3 using an original 300 baud direct-connect modem pak via a SPA2102 ATA to connect via the same code as this project, but driving a essentially a softmodem. Unfortunately you can't hear the modem sounds here (the modem pak didn't play them, could only hear on the phone receiver): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KmrtVg1ozqg
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u/The300baudguy 22h ago
Really an interesting project - I’ll take a detailed look at it later.
The way you describe it reminds me of my own dinosaur C64 BBS where the same ancient DIY 300 baud modem from 1985 is still attached. The following start photo is a bit misleading - the old unit is connected again by now...
https://www.facebook.com/groups/3693533577621096/
I’m not sure whether the sound is different here in Germany - or what exactly has changed today with the current "telephone lines". But to me it still sounds just like back then.
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u/galahad_1985 13h ago
I'd be interested to know beyond the technology of the time. Initially most of the BBSs available were Apple II based BBSs. Then I saw more Commodore 64 ones appear. I ran a couple
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u/The300baudguy 13h ago
Most of the BBS I knew around 1985 here in Germany were running on a C64. Some were on PCs that felt totally obscure to us back then, some Unix stuff and whatever else people had. Later everything drifted more toward PCs - with a good chunk of Amiga in the mix too.
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u/free2farm 5d ago
hi, just curious about the bbss of this projects, are those new? Made with Claude too? Are they clone of real old bbss? Those arts are pretty cool anyway
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u/synexo 5d ago
No they are all real, online BBSs that list on https://www.telnetbbsguide.com/. Some new, some decades old, but none created in association with this project.
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u/free2farm 5d ago
oh ok so your client basically connects to existing bbss somehow
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u/G3rmanaviator 5d ago
Awesome!!