Broadband and telephones

[aveatry]

My VoIP, has still to be tested, on an outgoing call. I've rung it, from my mobile, to confirm it works. I then had Avril ring it simultaneously, and then we discovered it had call waiting. I know it must have other VoIP features, but I have little idea what. YouFibre don't give any clues at all about the service.

Your VOIP does seem a bit cumbersome, my phone just plugged in the back of the router in a dedicated phone socket and away it went.
As for phone use i did have unlimited calls for may years as I was able to negotiate a good deal so it was basically free but this time they stood fast, I did some thinking and I hardly ever use the phone now as its all mobile and more often than not either WhatsApp or video WhatsApp calls.

 

[Mottie]

My VoIP, has still to be tested, on an outgoing call. I've rung it, from my mobile, to confirm it works. I then had Avril ring it simultaneously, and then we discovered it had call waiting. I know it must have other VoIP features, but I have little idea what. YouFibre don't give any clues at all about the service.

When I last renewed my Vodafone broadband contract, they sent me an adaptor/filter for my phone so that instead of plugging in to the BT socket, it plugged into the router. With the switch to FFTH, I needed no other routers/adaptor and my phone worked immediately. The engineer said they can sometimes take up to 48 hours for the phone to work properly if they are not already connected to the router.

 

[aveatry]

When I agreed to the free upgrade it was fibre with voice and as I understand it people who were up grading had to ask at the time of agreeing that they wanted voic as well so I think they do need to do something extra and mine was already pre done to prepare for voice --- maybe?

 

[Harry Bloomfield]

Your VOIP does seem a bit cumbersome, my phone just plugged in the back of the router in a dedicated phone socket and away it went.

No, not cumbersome at all. I simply plugged all of my internal lines, radiating from the old Master, into the back of the router. Just one cable, which feeds down through the house, to all of the socket.

 

[Harry Bloomfield]

When I agreed to the free upgrade it was fibre with voice and as I understand it people who were up grading had to ask at the time of agreeing that they wanted voic as well so I think they do need to do something extra and mine was already pre done to prepare for voice --- maybe?

Part of my reason for taking the VoIP, at the same time as fibre, was to ensure the install included a VoIP adaptor - I'd read that not all router's included the adaptor.

 

[aveatry]

No, not cumbersome at all. I simply plugged all of my internal lines, radiating from the old Master, into the back of the router. Just one cable, which feeds down through the house, to all of the socket.

I was referring to the extra steps needed to get the phone working

 

[Harry Bloomfield]

I was referring to the extra steps needed to get the phone working

Well, it took a few days, for the number to be ported across to VoIP. The VoIP was supposed to work on a temporary number, until the port, but that didn't happen. Then one day, I just got an email to say the VoIP was working with my original number.

 

[marcosmurab]

This is really just curiosity but the upcoming 'digitisation' of telephones has made me anxious to understand.
My house was built 1997 as part of a small estate and all cabling is ducted. I understand we have full fibre to the street cabinet. We have a ducted BT telephone cable (presumably copper) connected to a Master Socket just inside the house. Originally there were wired sub-connections to telephone extensions elsewhere in the house but these are now disconnected/unused and we have wireless phones everywhere but at the master socket.
We have had Virgin Broadband for some years which is connected via a separate ducted cable to an upstairs router. (I understand that Virgin use some sort of quasi 'full fibre' which is not actually full fibre?) Our telephone is also Virgin. However, I still need a corded phone plugged in to the Master Socket for the system to work.
Recently we have been offered 'full fibre' broadband all the way to the house but this does not carry landline telephone which has to be an 'add on' by a separate service.Speed Test
So what's going on? What is connected to what? What effect will the digitisation of land lines have? If our landline is provided by Virgin surely it is already digitised? So will this just switch off the power supply to the BT socket? In which case what happens to the corded phone attached to the BT socket.

Grateful for an idiot's guide as to how it all works!

They did away with the old phone line. She has a care alarm that worked over the old phone line as well as a cordless phone. I just plugged them both, via a filter, into the back of her modem and they both work fine.

 

[Harry Bloomfield]

They did away with the old phone line. She has a care alarm that worked over the old phone line as well as a cordless phone. I just plugged them both, via a filter, into the back of her modem and they both work fine.

What happens in a power cut? Did they supply some sort of UPS?

 

[aveatry]

When I had mine converted to full fibre I had to answer questions and if I answered answered YES to "do I have a care alarm" - or whatever they are called then they would not install the full fibre because of in the event of a power cut there would be no such alarm.

 

[Mottie]

When I had mine converted to full fibre I had to answer questions and if I answered answered YES to "do I have a care alarm" - or whatever they are called then they would not install the full fibre because of in the event of a power cut there would be no such alarm.

What powers the care alarm?

 

[Harry Bloomfield]

When I had mine converted to full fibre I had to answer questions and if I answered answered YES to "do I have a care alarm" - or whatever they are called then they would not install the full fibre because of in the event of a power cut there would be no such alarm.

Another 12months or so, and there will be no option to remain on copper.

 

[big-all]

They did away with the old phone line. She has a care alarm that worked over the old phone line as well as a cordless phone. I just plugged them both, via a filter, into the back of her modem and they both work fine.

the problem is not if they will work its iff the phone signal is lost when the router looses power in a power cut
iff the care alarm plugs in the mains and has a backup battery a powercut may or may not cause it to go off alerting the call centre where you can explain you have a powercut as the phone line is still powered
iff you have a power cut on full fibre your line is dead

unplug your router to simulate a powercut and try the system out including the call centre function

 

[Harry Bloomfield]

the problem is not if they will work its iff the phone signal is lost when the router looses power in a power cut
iff the care alarm plugs in the mains and has a backup battery a powercut may or may not cause it to go off alerting the call centre where you can explain you have a powercut as the phone line is still powered
iff you have a power cut on full fibre your line is dead

Back in the day, telephone exchanges had massive batteries in the basement, which kept the exchange and everyone's phones working, even if the mains were lost.