Page 1 of 1

2 Line Phone Connection Diagram - Ring Every Phone

Posted: Sat Mar 21, 2009 8:10 am
by cmikal
Here is a diagram for my setup. Maybe this will help someone. The goal here is to have my main number AND my second number ring throughout the house on any 2-line phone in the house. The second goal is to have phone number 1 light up line 1 on any phone in the house and have phone number 2 light up line 2 on any phone in the house so that you can visually tell, just by looking at the phone lights which phone number is ringing. I need this because I have a home-based business and need to know quickly and easily whether it is a personal call or business call. I also need to be able to keep my kids off the business line and give them an easy way to know that they are only to use line 1 (which I have assigned to the hub as my home phone number). The third goal is to have separate voice mail boxes for each phone number. (I am not going to describe that here since there are other posts that describe voice mail set up in the Ooma forums and my wiring diagram doesn't affect your ability to have separate mail boxes).

I have 3 phones. One is a single line phone in the bedroom. One is a 2-line Uniden cordless with a single handset. The third is a Panasonic 4-line office phone with a corded base station handset with the ability to have 4 cordless handsets. I am only using 2 handsets with this phone. This particular phone allows you to assign 1 handset to each line so when Line 1 rings, handset 1 can also ring; Line 2 rings, only handset 2 rings, etc.... (I mention this because I have seen other posts where it is mentioned that when their multi-handset phone rings all handsets ring). This model is more like a real office phone where you can transfer calls from the base station to any of the handsets if you want to, or receive calls only on your handset when your line rings.

Currently both hub and scout are in the basement physically located right next to each other and right next to the service entrance to my house, since, because they way my house is wired my cable modem and Linksys router are there, so getting this to work required hub and scout to be in the basement. I am planning on either running 2 sets of network cables to my kitchen area which would allow me to put both hub and scout on the small desk in my kitchen and still accomplish my goals. One final note: I had to create the crossover box. I don't think one is available on the open market. Just go to Radio Shack or other electronics store and get a roll of 4-wire phone cable and 2 boxes intended to accept the unterminated phone cable that would normally come out of your house wall on the back side of the box, and has an RJ/Phone connector on the front side. Take a few inches or more of cable, strip the ends, and wire the 2 boxes back-to-back as shown in the "X-box" diagram.

Hope this helps somebody.

Re: 2 Line Phone Connection Diagram - Ring Every Phone

Posted: Fri Mar 27, 2009 9:00 am
by johnboy
thanks for taking the time to write that. Perhaps OOMA will include both a FIRST LINE out ("Phone" - presently) and a second new RJ-11 jack on the back of the next designed ooma for the second line output. Now, one has to have a scout and go through your gyrations as diagramed to get to your result. And if you use your scout right next to the hub, you have no remote access to your message control center unless you use your computer or another scout. In fact, I am not sure you can plug another scout in (get it to receive the signalling from the hub) to a wall jack with your configuration.

In my situation, I have the HUB assigned line 2 and the scouts assigned line 1. Last I checked, there was no way to assign a number to an individual scout.

Just a random thought.

I have also had a dickens of a time trying to deal with my house cable (tv/internet). Houses in 1995 were not wired for two way internet cable. Amplifiers used do not do two way well either. So that limits the locations where I can place my cable modem and router and hub and scouts.

But I love my OOMA... with only two system glitches in as many years... it's still amazing. I have saved a TON of money.

QOS is the biggest issue for me second to the cable issue. With a family using the internet I didn't have time to figure out OOMA behind the router and QOS from the router to OOMA, so OOMA is in front. I finally got the QOS numbers right for my home.

Still - - - absolutely amazing.

Re: 2 Line Phone Connection Diagram - Ring Every Phone

Posted: Fri Mar 27, 2009 9:05 am
by murphy
johnboy wrote:Last I checked, there was no way to assign a number to an individual scout.
Sure there is. My second phone number is assigned to a scout. It only rings on the scout. The lights flash on the hub but it doesn't ring the phone connected to the hub.

Re: 2 Line Phone Connection Diagram - Ring Every Phone

Posted: Fri Mar 27, 2009 1:40 pm
by cmikal
johnboy wrote:And if you use your scout right next to the hub, you have no remote access to your message control center unless you use your computer or another scout.
Actually, you can remotely access your voicemail. Pick up the phone for line 1 or hit line 1 on you 2-line phone, then dial the phone number for line 2 (or the other way to think of it is to pick up the phone connected to the hub and dial the phone number assigned to the scout). Conversely, if you want voicemail for line 1, pick up the phone for line 2 or hit line 2 on you 2-line phone, then dial the phone number for line 1 (or the other way to think of it is to pick up the phone connected to the scout and dial the phone number assigned to the hub). In either case the appropriate voicemail box will answer (assuming you have set up voice mail properly to have a separate mail box for each line).

It may not be as handy as having the hub or scout in your living area (as opposed to the basement as it is currently set up in my house) but it works.

As soon as I can get some time to run some network cable from the basement into my kitchen, I will be able to move the hub/scout to the kitchen, which will eliminate the problem of having the boxes in the basement.

Also, I think that if your telephone wiring has more than 2 pair (4 wires) in the cable, you can probably wire your house so that you can put the hub and scout wherever you want by using the normal line 1 pair for the wall port communication line, then use what would be the line 2 and line 3 pair for the hub and scout as I have drawn it up with the crossover box in the diagram.

I haven't tried it, but it should work.