DSL filter required?

[lentang]

I am running ooma over DSL. The setup manual seems to indicate that the DSL filters are not needed but neither the ooma base nor the ooma scouts seem to work without DSL filters installed. Is this correct?

[southsound]

The answer to whether or not you need a filter or splitter will depend on your configuration. Are you using a "dry loop" DSL signal (DSL only - no voice line) or a combined DSL/Voice signal? If you kept your land line, it is probably the latter. I'll speak briefly to both situations.

With no landline:
If you are using one or more scouts, you will need a clean pair of wires between the "wall" jacks on both devices. If your house has fairly modern wiring, there are multiple pairs of wires in the cable that feeds your phone jacks. The first pair is the white/blue pair and is probably feeding the DSL modem. The second pair is the white/orange pair and could be connected to jacks for use with the ooma and scout "wall" connections. As long as nothing besides the DSL modem is connected to the white/blue pair, you will not need any filters or splitters.

If you are using only the hub and no scouts, just connect your cordless phone to the "phone" jack on the back of the hub. If you want to feed other phones in your home without using scouts, use this connection to feed regular phones using the second pair as noted above. Again, as long as the DSL modem and phones are on separate pairs, no filters or splitters are needed.

If you have a landline:
If you are using ooma with DSL and a landline, it is important to separate the DSL and voice signals. Some use the microfilters supplied by their telco, but I prefer to separate the signals using a DSL Splitter like the Wilcom PS-15. This device goes before ALL other devices and provides a clean output for the DSL modem and a clean output for the voice line.

Here is a quote from a previous post of mine to save retyping:

I have been using a Wilcom PS-15 xDSL splitter with great success. The DSL Splitter is a different device than the ooma splitter or the microfilters supplied by the telco. In fact, although they have been around for quite a while and Wilcom is a common supplier to the telcos, my installer had never seen one and wanted me to use the microfilters. I had him put his test gear on the splitter and he was amazed. The splitter is still a passive device, but works where the microfilters will not. I knew I needed one because I had over 13 phone devices in our home. No all were phones - 2 ReplayTVs, fax machines, cordless phones, DishNetwork, etc. You can read about the device at the following link: http://www.wilcominc.com/item.cfm?ProdID=35

You just need to put the PS-15 before all the rest of the phone wiring - and when you do, you can hook up the scout as required. The leads that feed the telephones are completely free of DSL signal, but will pass the required signals for the Scout to work. In this application, you will NOT need any additional DSL microfilters or splitters. Click the following link to see how it is wired: http://www.wilcominc.com/product_pdfs/P ... ematic.pdf