When try to connect to Internet USB Modem (Huawei/ZTE/LG/Nokia), it gives error: “Unable to open serial port” or “Unable to open COM port for USB Modem”

Symptoms

1.  After installation USB Modem (Huawei/ZTE/LG/Nokia) works good, but when it is run after a restart of Windows XP/Vista/Windows 7, it gives error “Unable to open serial port” or “Unable to open COM port for USB Modem”. When USB Modem is plugged-out and plugged-in again, the problem gets resolved, and starts functioning again.

2.      The USB modem is detected without any problem.

3.      “Query Modem” feature from Device Manager > Modems > XXXX USB Modem > Diagnostics > Query Modem is working successfully.

The Problem

Possible reason of the problems is that there is conflict of Serial Ports (COM__) between the USB Modem and applications already installed on the Windows system.

Solution

One of the solutions for this problem is to manually assign the free and higher order Serial Ports (COM__) to the USB Modem:

1.      Select My Computer, right-click and click to Properties:

2.      Go to Hardware tab and click Device Manager button:

3.      In Device Manager, select the Ports, and find your USB Modem, right-click it and select

Properties, for example, for ZTE USB Modem:

4.      In USB Modem Properties, got to the tab “Port Settings” and click “Advanced” button:

5.      Now, from the drop down list “COM Port Number”, select a higher order and not in use serial port, for example, in the given picture below, COM71onwards can be selected.

6.      Do the same procedure for all the COM ports used by the USB Modem. For example: for ZTE Diagnostics Port, ZTE GPS Port, ZTE Service Port, and ZTE Voice Port set COM71, COM 72, COM73, and COM74.

To count characters/words/lines in text or in a text file or in a string/sentence/paragraph , using Microsoft Office Word, or OpenOffice.org Word Processor or Google Docs.

i. If you have got Microsoft Office 2007, then the easiest way of counting characters is to just copy and paste the text into Microsoft Office Word, go to Review menu and select Word Count.

It will display number of Words, Characters (no spaces), Characters (with spaces), Lines etc. Example: For the text “It will display”, it shows below figures:

ii. If you have got Microsoft Office 2003 or Microsoft Office XP, then copy and paste the text into Microsoft Office Word, go to Tool menu and select Word Count. It will display number of Words, Characters (no spaces), Characters (with spaces), Lines etc. Example: For the text “It will display”, it shows below figures:

iii. If you have got a Linux distribution such as Ubuntu, RedHat, Fedora, OpenSUSE, Mandriva etc. with OpenOffice.org, then copy and paste the text into OpenOffice.org Word Processor, go to Tools menu and select Word Count. It will display number of Words, Characters (no spaces), Characters (with spaces), Lines etc. Example: For the text “It will display”, it shows below figures:

iv. If you have got neither Microsoft Office nor OpenOffice.org, but have got a free GMail Account, then Google will help you:

Log-on to your GMail Account and click the Google Doc:

In the Google docs page, go to Create New and select Document:

v.  Paste the text in the Google docs word processor, and go to Tools menu and select Word count.

It will display number of Words, Characters (no spaces), Characters (with spaces) etc. Example: For the text “It will display”, it shows below figures: