new extension and digital voice

grinch53

H,
does anyone know if telephone sockets allow transmission in either direction?
Got new bb with digital voice so want to connect the phone in conservatory to router.Need to run an external cable(avoiding trailing/ trunking it through house) to new router position, not sure what kind of terminal box I need.
thanks

Mark_d

Yes telephone sockets allow transmission in either direction.  You can make calls as well as receive.

ThisIsWeird

Interesting.
Is this fibre? Does your router have a telephone-style socket on its back for plugging in digital phones for calls via the 'net?
I would confirm first using, say, the technical forum of the BB provider concerned, that extending a digital telephone cable like this is ok. I guess good chance it is, but I don't know. I think it'd also involve some adaptation, such as a connector between the router's telephone socket and the nearby telephone socket you plan to use. If that socket is a 'master', I suspect issues, so it may need to be wired directly to the actual extension cable.
But, no idea
I think it is usually recommended to use wireless handsets, the main base plugged into the router, and have slave phones set up on charging stations where required. As long as the signal is strong enough.

casper_gutman

The situation may vary by broadband supplier, depending on the hardware solutions they supply.

I think the official line from BT at least is that once you transfer to FTTP with digital voice your existing extensions will cease to work and you should use their "digital voice adapters" - basically, a small box which plugs into a mains power outlet and connects wirelessly to the router they supply. Your existing phone then plugs into the adapter. BT will supply one unit free, and you can buy more (I think they're about £20). This works okay as long as you're in range, but the range isn't quite as much as you might hope. It doesn't use wifi but a variation on DECT, like an ordinary cordless landline phone.

Unofficially, it's relatively straightforward to modify the existing extension wiring so it can be connected back to the smart hub router instead of the old copper landline. See e.g., Telephones and Digital Voice how to keep using your old phone | thinkbroadband. I've also seen reports that this can be done just by connecting a cable from the hub to the old master socket, after disconnecting the incoming copper wires from the exchange that used to provide telephone service - e.g., Re: Correct way to enable all BT sockets after Dig... - Page 3 - BT Community

I should say, the above is all based on things I read. What I actually did was to replace all the extension handsets with BT Essential Digital Home Phone | BT Help. BT provided a code to buy these at a 'discounted' price, about £20-£30 I think, but I actually bought a job lot of five on a certain auction site for ~£25.

Albermarle

You can use your existing phone, but as above for the cost of a new BT essential digital phone, it is far easier to use these as they connect seamlessly with the router with no cables.
BT Essential Digital Home Phone (090709) | EE Store

£30 each free delivery.

Chickereeeee

Albermarle said:

You can use your existing phone, but as above for the cost of a new BT essential digital phone, it is far easier to use these as they connect seamlessly with the router with no cables.
BT Essential Digital Home Phone (090709) | EE Store

£30 each free delivery.

Using BTs DV phones does lock you into BT though, as they don't work with any other supplier.

casper_gutman

Chickereeeee said:

Using BTs DV phones does lock you into BT though, as they don't work with any other supplier.

True that's a downside. But every cloud has a silver lining, and this is probably why the market's awash with preowned barely used BT handsets.

Albermarle

Chickereeeee said:

Albermarle said:

You can use your existing phone, but as above for the cost of a new BT essential digital phone, it is far easier to use these as they connect seamlessly with the router with no cables.
BT Essential Digital Home Phone (090709) | EE Store

£30 each free delivery.

Using BTs DV phones does lock you into BT though, as they don't work with any other supplier.

Yes true, but on the other side some broadband suppliers do not offer a digital 'landline' at all, so if you want one when the conventional landline is switched off you have a limited choice of provider anyway. Also the ones that do, tend to have expensive PAYG charging. If you want to use a digital landline regularly with an 'anytime calls' package I think BT is probably the best bet.

ButtersUK

casper_gutman said:

Chickereeeee said:

Using BTs DV phones does lock you into BT though, as they don't work with any other supplier.

True that's a downside. But every cloud has a silver lining, and this is probably why the market's awash with preowned barely used BT handsets.

That's very true, there are hundreds of cordless DECT (digitally enhanced cordless telecoms) phones on Ebay where lots are described as "opened but unused" as well as 'used' ones in various conditions ranging from like-new to dreadful.

I recently got FTTP (fibre to the premises)  from my ISP (internet service provider) and also took out a plan for VOIP telephony with an excellent company called Andrews and Arnold .... and bought, off Ebay, a BT Diverse 7150  base unit (inc. handset) plus two 7100 'additional' base/handsets plus a further two 7400 'additiona'l base/handsets ....( totalling one base and five handsets) ... all for £51 delivered and they were unused and boxed and work a treat having been plugged into the router.

BT's Diverse range of DECT cordless phones were traditionally made by Siemens - I don't know if they are now but I do believe they're a bit more robust than some other BT ranges.  I've had my old BT Diverse 5110 phones well over twenty years and out of the original five phones three are still with me and worked fine before I recently retired them in favour of the aforementioned 7 series Diverse phones.

Places like Ligo, PMC, Amazon, Argos sell new or refurbished sets of DECT phones from all the main manufacturers like Panasonic, Gigaset, BT etc.and most will plug into the green phone socket at the back of some routers and work straight away - providing you've got them configured to work on the new fibre network via VOIP.

koalakoala

Waste of time in my house ( a bungalow)
Only works in certain rooms and cuts off all the time
After spending many hours on the phone to BT, they said they don’t know how to fix it 🤷‍♀️

ButtersUK

I suspect that spending time with "some" BT customer service advisors isn't invariably a foolproof means of solving problems.  But I presume you've sought advice elsewhere too and still drawn blank in which case, short of trying a completely separate set of cordless phones( different make, different model etc) then it's a tricky one. Foil backed plasterboard and extra thick walls are two areas that can cause problems but, in my own case the complete set of handsets all work both on the ground and first floors and out in the garage too.