I hate modems. They are generically a pain to get operational, even if it's a plug and play modem.
Nobody likes modems because they are a pain to install.
COM ports by themselves are a pain, and if you have a conflict with one, it's even worse. We have however seen a modem that made us realize that it wasn't the modems that were a pain, it was just the COM ports. Today's candidate is the Actiontec USB Call Waiting Modem. Quite simply, USB means that to install the modem, you just plug it into your USB port on the PC and then install drivers. It's as easy as that.