GA-7VAXP and Comm ports.

For some reason that is not obvious there seems to be a problem with the Com
ports. It had been OK then something happened but not sure what. I cannot
read my camera anymore and I have been trying to set up an external modem,
which has worked on another machine. I have the latest version of BIOS -
14 - but don't think that is the problem. Suspect something has gone wrong
with the board. I am getting a lot of modem problems as well and took my
modem off but could not put it back; had to use restore. This problem has
consumed a lot of time so far. Has anybody else had this bother? A solution
would be useful but not expected.

It may be to do with OEM processors as the situation got worse when I
installed a XP2600+ been trying to find out if it is an OEM or not but seems
this information is hard to come by. I am going to buy a newer board.