CAT 5 hub setup

[RedLead550]

Hi all,

I just got my Ooma and like many have a somewhat different setup. I have a new house where all the wiring comes into a hub in the master bedroom closet. So each phone line can be used as either a phone line or a CAT 5 line but not both. What I'd like to do is to set up the Ooma device in my kitchen but I'm not sure how to do it. I have a cable modem so I can't plug that in to the CAT 5 wiring so the modem and wireless router are in my closet, which seems to mean that I'll also have to put my Ooma device there and a Scout in my kitchen. Also, I'm not sure how to hook the Ooma device into my closet hub in order to have all the available phone lines work with the hub.

Thanks for any reply's!

[Soundjudgment]

Not knowing the layout of your House Hub, some things are assumed here. As long as you clearly choose WHICH Cat6 line-jack goes directly to a single physical RJ45 wall-jack location in the house, you should be fine. You can only go from Point A to Point B in this, so let's concentrate on that Bedroom to Kitchen idea you have.

Here is the secret:

You can PLUG an RJ11 Phone wire into an RJ45 Ethernet Cat5/6 jack. Yes! It fits right in. And even though the RJ11 from a normal phone only sports two actual wires (the proverbial RED and GREEN), it will use the same two wire contacts out of an 8-pin RJ45 Ethernet wall plate jack on both ends of the wired-connections in each room of the house.

You should be able to hook up your Ooma Hub to the Cable Modem/Router as normal. Then plug a Phone to the 'telephone jack' on the Back of the Ooma Hub and test it out. Once you determine it is working as it should be, then plug an RJ 11 telephone wire to the back of the Ooma box marked WALL... and place that very RJ11 phone wire INTO THE CAT5/6 Ethernet jack on the House-Hub box. The one going to the Kitchen area (or marked KITCHEN) should be your choice for connection.

Now what does this all mean?

Again, you would be hooking up a Telephone wire (RJ11) with the small connector head... INTO a House Hub RJ45 Ethernet jack. Since there is no power or bridging concerns with this setup, you should be fine in doing this method. The goal is to make use of your House Ethernet-Hub wiring to get the telephone signal from the Ooma Box WALL jack output, over to the Kitchen area to meet up with the Ooma Scout unit you plan on installing there.

Then the next step of course is to take the secondary Ooma Scout Box over to the Kitchen and plug in another RJ11 Phone wire into that area's RJ45 Ethernet-Jack port. Use this phone wire to connect the Scout Box and plug your Kitchen phone into the Scout's Phone port and you should hear the now-famous OOOOoooma dial-tone as a shared-device!

Again, be sure that these are straight, dry RJ45 Ethernet port connections from your Hub Box to your destination area for the second phone. There is no electrical danger in plugging a Phone wire into an Ethernet HUB that has no other signal or electrical current on it, so you should be able to accomplish your mission without having to run more phone lines other than the ones mentioned above.

[RedLead550]

Thanks a lot, that helps. I did try to set up the the Scout this way plugging Ooma into the hub marked for the kitchen but I could not get the Scout to work. Any other ideas?

[Soundjudgment]

Again, we are making a couple of assumptions, such as your House Cat6 wiring payout is complete and error-free. That means from your Hub to the Kitchen area in this case. It would be nice if there was a way to confirm this, but without a Cat-port tester this is unknown. There is also the physical distance footage-factor of the house-wiring itself.

One thing to confirm is that operation is alright from the Ooma Hub to Scout. Bring the Scout unit back into the Bedroom and connect a short telephone wire (the RJ11 kind) between the Ooma HUB's WALL Port and the Scout. Power up both into service and connect a telephone to the Scout. If things are well between the two, the Scout should operate as normal while connected to the Ooma Hub.

Now consider that all you are trying to do after proving its operation is to *extend* that signal between the two rooms of the House. So the only additional thing in the mix is the House Ethernet HUB wiring and connectivity. Assuming there is good wiring between the two locations, nothing should really be changing except that you are placing more physical wiring in the signal-path to get service from Ooma Hub out to the Ooma Scout in the kitchen.

Do that test mentioned above first, and see if everything is functional in the Ooma system.

[RedLead550]

Hi Soundjudgement,

Thanks again for the help. I think there is a way to sort of test that line as right now the phone service is coming in to the house through the hub and does go to the kitchen plug through that line so it should be working.

I did as you suggested and the Scout does not seem to be working. Also, the Ooma hub does not go blue when I plug the Scout into the Wall port on the Ooma hub. Does this mean that the Scout may be faulty?

Thanks again.

[Soundjudgment]

The Ooma HUB should go Blue when you have proper Internet connectivity going to it. It does not make any difference if the Scout unit is plugged into the Hub first or not. If there is no blue tab glowing on the back of the Ooma Hub, then the Ooma service will never function correctly in the first place. So that issue is always the first to solve.

[RedLead550]

The hub is only going blue once all connections are made (excluding plugging in a phone to the hub). So if the hub isn't plugged into the wall it is staying red.

Thanks a lot for spending some time on my problem.

[Bobby B]

Hi Bert, it looks like your ooma Hub is configured to work with your landline right now.

This means, you must have an active phone line connection plugged into the WALL port of the ooma Hub, otherwise the Hub will not go into service.

Is the phone number assigned to your ooma system currently part of an existing landline or other phone service in your home?

Thanks,
Bobby

[RedLead550]

Hi Bobby,

Yes, I do still have an active phone line in my home. I wanted to be sure that everything worked well before I switched everything over to Ooma. So, what do I need to do to get everything working correctly?