You modem need a modem, an ethernet card or a wireless card.

Most laptops computers include two Type 2 PCMCIA card slots. They accept PCMCIA devices, which are about the size of a credit card. Modems, ethernet and wifi cards all come in this format. You will need a device driver that allows your PCMCIA card to talk to your laptop. There should be either a CDROM or for older devices a Floppy Disk that contains the softare.

You need to have service with an Internet Service Provider (ISP). There are companies like AOL, Earthlink and your local telephone company. You will need an account with them an a CDROM to load their software on their laptop.

The third ingredient is either a telelphone line to connect the modem to the local telephone network, a cable modem or a DSL modem to connect the Ethernet card to the ISPs network. If you have wireless you need to connect a wireless router to your cable or DSL line. This will transmit a signal the the wifi card in the laptop.

The laptop is Internet Ready if you have all three: a device in the laptop with it's drive that allow communications, an ISP and a telelphone line or cable or DSL connect that gets you to the Internet.

Your speed on the Internet is dependent upon your connection to the Internet. Modem connections are ten times slower than DSL and cable connections and some cable connections and wireless connections are faster than DSL connections.