debian sarge installation problem

good day everyone!

i have recently installed debian sarge in my compaq presario 2500
laptop. modem is M5457 AC-LINK MODEM. anyway, using scanModem, i
determined my softmodem is conexant type.

my  linux kernel is 2.6.8-2.i686. kernel modules, header, source are
all installed for this version. i also installed devfs version
1.3.25-19. i downloaded hsfmodem_7.18.00.02full_i386.deb. then as root
i executed dpkg:

$ dpkg -i hsfmodem_7.18.00.02full_i386.deb
 
i entered my build directory when prompted: /lib/modules/2.6.8-2-i686/build

after building the modules, this appeared:

find: /etc/devs/symlinks.d: No such file or directory
devfsd: No devfs on /dev, not starting

ERROR: hsf not active
dpkg: error processing hsfmodem(--install)
 subprocess post-installation script returned error exit status 1
Errors were encountered while processing hsfmodem

i browsed this page: http://www.fifi.org/doc/devfsd/README.Debian

which says:

"/etc/devfs/symlinks.d and /etc/devfs/symlinks are deprecated and will be
removed in a future version.  /etc/devfs/conf.d files can do every type of
sym-link creation you could desire."

is it possible that my version of devfs is not supported since it
doesn't make use of symlink anymore?

help is very much appreciated. thank you so much!