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Re: Dial Tone through out home

Posted: Sat Jun 05, 2010 4:23 pm
by heymon
tommies wrote:No, you don't need to do any thing.

There is only one bunch of wires (probably a CAT5 cable). The wires have been cut clean, so you're good. FYI, the little jack at 3 & 4 in this newer pic. and at A & B in pic. 1 are called 'test jack.' This is the divide point between the telco. responsibility and the house owner responsibility.

Now you can try to feed the ooma dial tone to one of the wall jack and see if it works.
Works just fine now. thanks for all the help!

I do still have an issue where only people in my neighborhood who had the same digital phone provider as I previously did (Cox) still get a 'number not in service' message, whereas everyone else outside of my neighborhood get through just fine. I've emailed Cox about the issue since I think it's something in their system. I ported my number to Ooma several weeks ago.

anyhow, thanks for the wiring help!

Re: Dial Tone through out home

Posted: Sat Jun 05, 2010 4:54 pm
by southsound
heymon wrote:I do still have an issue where only people in my neighborhood who had the same digital phone provider as I previously did (Cox) still get a 'number not in service' message, whereas everyone else outside of my neighborhood get through just fine.
Have one of your neighbors who currently has difficulty calling you using their Cox phone contact Cox's customer support and complain that they are not able to reach a known good number. Cox won't care much about your complaint but they will listen to a current customer and take care of getting your number out of their database ASAP.

Re: Dial Tone through out home

Posted: Sat Jun 19, 2010 7:30 pm
by lhight
Hi, I'm sure that this question has come up a lot, but I have spend quite a bit of time on this forum and haven't been able to figure out the answer to my problem. I have an Telo. I just got my number ported. I have dsl. I want to distribute my Ooma to all the phone jacks in my home. How can I do this without disrupting my DSL? I'll gladly give more info as needed... I just don't know what more to say at this point. ;)

Re: Dial Tone through out home

Posted: Sat Jun 19, 2010 9:49 pm
by southsound
lhight wrote:Hi, I'm sure that this question has come up a lot, but I have spend quite a bit of time on this forum and haven't been able to figure out the answer to my problem. I have an Telo. I just got my number ported. I have dsl. I want to distribute my Ooma to all the phone jacks in my home. How can I do this without disrupting my DSL? I'll gladly give more info as needed... I just don't know what more to say at this point. ;)
The key is keeping your DSL signal from the phone (voice) signal. You can do this one of two ways. If you are using existing wiring only, then use the second (usually orange/white) pair of wires to distribute dialtone. You can either rewire all of the jacks or use two-line splitters to accomplish this. The other option is to run a "home run" cable from your DSL modem to the telco line that comes into the Network Interface Box and disconnect your home wiring from that box. Then you can just plug your Telo PHONE port and any phone you like into any phone jack in the house. It's a little late so let me know if this isn't clear and I'll try to be more concise.

Re: Dial Tone through out home

Posted: Mon Jun 21, 2010 6:39 am
by lhight
southsound wrote:
lhight wrote:Hi, I'm sure that this question has come up a lot, but I have spend quite a bit of time on this forum and haven't been able to figure out the answer to my problem. I have an Telo. I just got my number ported. I have dsl. I want to distribute my Ooma to all the phone jacks in my home. How can I do this without disrupting my DSL? I'll gladly give more info as needed... I just don't know what more to say at this point. ;)
The key is keeping your DSL signal from the phone (voice) signal. You can do this one of two ways. If you are using existing wiring only, then use the second (usually orange/white) pair of wires to distribute dialtone. You can either rewire all of the jacks or use two-line splitters to accomplish this. The other option is to run a "home run" cable from your DSL modem to the telco line that comes into the Network Interface Box and disconnect your home wiring from that box. Then you can just plug your Telo PHONE port and any phone you like into any phone jack in the house. It's a little late so let me know if this isn't clear and I'll try to be more concise.
Forgive my complete ignorance with telephone lines. I'm willing to learn though. I'm trying to do this without my husband's help as he's got a very busy week. I think we have a home run line. What do you think? A year ago we ran a line to our living room where I wanted our computer because we didn't have a phone jack there. It went straight from our box outside to our living room. Both phone and DSL is on it. If this is indeed a home run line, we just need to disconnect the phone wiring from the NIB or the phone jack by my computer?

Another question: if we used the 2-line splitter option, would we loose any sort of signal strength? How would I know which line to plug my phones into?

Given the information I gave you, which option do you think would be my best bet? I really appreciate your help.

Re: Dial Tone through out home

Posted: Mon Jun 21, 2010 8:06 am
by southsound
lhight wrote: Forgive my complete ignorance with telephone lines. I'm willing to learn though. I'm trying to do this without my husband's help as he's got a very busy week.
No problem. I think this is something we can easily walk you through to the finish line!

I think we have a home run line. What do you think? A year ago we ran a line to our living room where I wanted our computer because we didn't have a phone jack there. It went straight from our box outside to our living room. Both phone and DSL is on it. If this is indeed a home run line, we just need to disconnect the phone wiring from the NIB or the phone jack by my computer?
What you describe is an ideal situation. The new wire to the computer location is going to be the key here. It will have at least two pairs of wire. Most likely blue/white are used for the DSL modem/phone and there will be an orange/white pair that may not even be connected - or it may be connected as Line 2 (to the black/yellow wires in the jack). This is were you want it connected so if the wires are just loose, connect them here.

Next, go to your NIB and locate the new wiring. Disconnect all of the wires that are connected to the screws where the blue/white pair are connected EXCEPT the wires from this new line. Then connect the wires you just removed to the orange/white wires from the new cable. Connect white/blue to white/orange using a "scotchlock" connector or tape. Then do the same for the white/blue and white/orange. This will act as a "feed" to bring ooma dialtone to the other jacks in your home. You can get the scotchlock connectors at Home Depot or most hardware stores. They are gel filled so they keep out moisture better than tape.

Then, go back to the jack where your DSL modem is connected. Plug in a TWO-LINE splitter. The modem goes to L1 and a cord from your ooma PHONE port goes to the L2 jack.


Another question: if we used the 2-line splitter option, would we loose any sort of signal strength? The spilitter will have no effect on call quality. How would I know which line to plug my phones into? See above for how to connect the ooma - and your phones go just where they have always gone. If you want a phone where the ooma is, you will need to put a SINGLE-LINE splitter at the PHONE port of the ooma so you can plug a phone in there.

Given the information I gave you, which option do you think would be my best bet? Described above. I really appreciate your help. No problem - that's why the forum exists. Let us know how it works out for you or if you have more questions.

Re: Dial Tone through out home

Posted: Tue Jun 22, 2010 7:20 am
by lhight
southsound wrote:
lhight wrote: Forgive my complete ignorance with telephone lines. I'm willing to learn though. I'm trying to do this without my husband's help as he's got a very busy week.
No problem. I think this is something we can easily walk you through to the finish line!

I think we have a home run line. What do you think? A year ago we ran a line to our living room where I wanted our computer because we didn't have a phone jack there. It went straight from our box outside to our living room. Both phone and DSL is on it. If this is indeed a home run line, we just need to disconnect the phone wiring from the NIB or the phone jack by my computer?
What you describe is an ideal situation. The new wire to the computer location is going to be the key here. It will have at least two pairs of wire. Most likely blue/white are used for the DSL modem/phone and there will be an orange/white pair that may not even be connected - or it may be connected as Line 2 (to the black/yellow wires in the jack). This is were you want it connected so if the wires are just loose, connect them here.

Next, go to your NIB and locate the new wiring. Disconnect all of the wires that are connected to the screws where the blue/white pair are connected EXCEPT the wires from this new line. Then connect the wires you just removed to the orange/white wires from the new cable. Connect white/blue to white/orange using a "scotchlock" connector or tape. Then do the same for the white/blue and white/orange. This will act as a "feed" to bring ooma dialtone to the other jacks in your home. You can get the scotchlock connectors at Home Depot or most hardware stores. They are gel filled so they keep out moisture better than tape.

Then, go back to the jack where your DSL modem is connected. Plug in a TWO-LINE splitter. The modem goes to L1 and a cord from your ooma PHONE port goes to the L2 jack.


Another question: if we used the 2-line splitter option, would we loose any sort of signal strength? The spilitter will have no effect on call quality. How would I know which line to plug my phones into? See above for how to connect the ooma - and your phones go just where they have always gone. If you want a phone where the ooma is, you will need to put a SINGLE-LINE splitter at the PHONE port of the ooma so you can plug a phone in there.

Given the information I gave you, which option do you think would be my best bet? Described above. I really appreciate your help. No problem - that's why the forum exists. Let us know how it works out for you or if you have more questions.
Thanks for the response. I will be heading to Home Depot today to purchase "Snaplock" connectors and a 2-line splitter. I plan on going ahead and trying this option with the home run line. When I looked at the wiring where my computer is located, I have green and white wires that connected to green and red wires in the jack (DSL/phone) and orange and white wires that connect to yellow and black (Line 2). My blue and white wires aren't connected. This will still be okay, right?

Other question here is somewhat hypothetical. If I weren't distributing the dial tone using the home run option, all I would need would be the 2-line splitters for jacks where I plan to have my Telo as well as the jacks that I want my phones? Seems like it would be easier... if I'm understanding this correctly.

Re: Dial Tone through out home

Posted: Tue Jun 22, 2010 8:42 pm
by southsound
lhight wrote:Thanks for the response. I will be heading to Home Depot today to purchase "Snaplock" connectors and a 2-line splitter. I plan on going ahead and trying this option with the home run line. When I looked at the wiring where my computer is located, I have green and white wires that connected to green and red wires in the jack (DSL/phone) and orange and white wires that connect to yellow and black (Line 2). My blue and white wires aren't connected. This will still be okay, right? You bet. You might want to open up one of the other jacks to see how they are wired as well. Bottom line, if the orange/white pair for line 2 are available and disconnected from the telco service, they will work fine for sending dialtone to the rest of the house.

Other question here is somewhat hypothetical. If I weren't distributing the dial tone using the home run option, all I would need would be the 2-line splitters for jacks where I plan to have my Telo as well as the jacks that I want my phones? Seems like it would be easier... if I'm understanding this correctly. I like using a few splitters as possible because sooner or later someone will unplug a splitter and try putting the phone directly into the jack and wonder why things don't work. But using the splitters is another viable option. Again, check to see how the other jacks are wired.

Re: Dial Tone through out home

Posted: Wed Jun 23, 2010 7:53 am
by lhight
southsound wrote:
lhight wrote:Thanks for the response. I will be heading to Home Depot today to purchase "Snaplock" connectors and a 2-line splitter. I plan on going ahead and trying this option with the home run line. When I looked at the wiring where my computer is located, I have green and white wires that connected to green and red wires in the jack (DSL/phone) and orange and white wires that connect to yellow and black (Line 2). My blue and white wires aren't connected. This will still be okay, right? You bet. You might want to open up one of the other jacks to see how they are wired as well. Bottom line, if the orange/white pair for line 2 are available and disconnected from the telco service, they will work fine for sending dialtone to the rest of the house.

Other question here is somewhat hypothetical. If I weren't distributing the dial tone using the home run option, all I would need would be the 2-line splitters for jacks where I plan to have my Telo as well as the jacks that I want my phones? Seems like it would be easier... if I'm understanding this correctly. I like using a few splitters as possible because sooner or later someone will unplug a splitter and try putting the phone directly into the jack and wonder why things don't work. But using the splitters is another viable option. Again, check to see how the other jacks are wired.
Okay, I did some looking at the other jacks in my house. I'm getting confused. Just looks like a lot of nicely colored wires. :( So, I've uploaded some pictures.
Here's my NIB. I'm guessing that my new line from the home run is the white wire (because it looks newest!) I'm wondering which wires were for the telephone.
IMG_2128.JPG
NIB
IMG_2128.JPG (53.87KiB)Viewed 6887 times
Here's my home run jack. With green/white going to yellow/black and orange/white going to yellow/red
IMG_2127.JPG
Home Run line jack
IMG_2127.JPG (32.17KiB)Viewed 6887 times
And here's pix of a couple of other jacks in the house. One is newer (left) the other is older (right). The new one has orange/white wires going to red/green. The older one, red/black to red/black.
ehow.jpg
Newer jack in house (left) older jack (right)
ehow.jpg (28.59KiB)Viewed 6887 times
I hope this isn't all a jumbled mess to you.

Re: Dial Tone through out home

Posted: Thu Jun 24, 2010 7:51 pm
by lhight
And now we have a dial tone in every jack. My hubby took matters in his own hands and called his friend over to help. They ended up doing basically what Southsound said (We just needed in-person guidance). And since I attached pictures in my last post, I figure it might help someone else out there if I just say what we did to get it work using a home run line.

On the NIB, we took all the wires that were on the post with the DSL (orange/white in my case) off the screws and connected them to the line 2 wires (which were green/white in my case) from our home run line with connectors. Used the 2-line connector where our Ooma and DSL plug into the phone jack, with the Ooma plugged into the Line 2 and the DSL modem plugged into Line 1. This distributed the dialtone to all the jacks in the home.

Thank you, Southsound.