Sorry if I misled you.

When we built the house I put in a phone socket in every room as a daisy chain going back to the master socket which is on the end of the house where the incoming overhead feed line enters the house.
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When we got FTTC I put a new faceplate on the master socket and ran a Cat5e cable to the router location at the other end of the house.

I have a number of patch leads wired to the present router location which would make moving it difficult.

There is a telphone socket near the router which is 4 wire connected as part of the phone system. My plan would be to disconnect the phone system from the master socket and just use the existing 4 wire between the router and DECT base station locations.

I am capable of disconnecting the phone system from the master socket.

Sounds like you have the flexibility you need for patching then.

In future personally I think most people will be simpler to have everything managed by the router itself since you can see the incoming calls listed there as well the paired handsets, name the handsets, and optionally set things like time ranges for which phones will ring incoming calls at what times of day.

However I would understand if you want to compare the answerphone features before deciding, and I know some people also have become used to call barring or call screening features on their base stations.

Fortunately you don't have to decide any of that on the day of switchover if you do go down this route and retain your own base station meantime.

The main thing to avoid is inadvertently backfeeding the FON output onto the external telephone line since having two 48V supplies fighting on the same copper pair does not go well, and the PSTN voltage from the exchange (and dial tone) is not always discontinued immediately or even the same day.

However it sounds like you have that aspect covered too and understand the separation.

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An aside, over in the Home Networking forum their are recurring conversations about people putting a small switch in a central location for patching (sometimes the loft or a cupboard under the stairs) which makes wired devices less dependent on a fixed location for the router itself.

If I had my own place I would probably be going down that route as there is not much sign of new builds including ethernet cabling to all rooms as standard, especially now that there is such a trend for "Wi-Fi all the things" and "oh just add a plug-in booster or mesh system".

Edited by prlzx (Mon 19-Feb-24 22:26:57)

I just moved my mum over to zen for vdsl and digi voice. Plugged her base station (panasonic) in to the router via the black supplied adapter it all works. The weird thing is there is no dial tone which caused much confusion, inbound and outbound calls work. I queried this with Zen who told me you don't get a dial tone....so I hope that's correct

Edited by choppersrock (Tue 20-Feb-24 07:31:05)

In reply to a post by choppersrock:

.......................... The weird thing is there is no dial tone which caused much confusion, inbound and outbound calls work. I queried this with Zen who told there you don't get a dial tone....so I hope that's correct

That is weird! I am pleased that you told me as I take the dialtone to be the sign that the line is working.

In reply to a post by choppersrock:

I just moved my mum over to zen for vdsl and digi voice. Plugged her base station (panasonic) in to the router via the black supplied adapter it all works. The weird thing is there is no dial tone which caused much confusion, inbound and outbound calls work. I queried this with Zen who told me you don't get a dial tone....so I hope that's correct

Does that leave an opening for scammers who typically tell the potential mark to put the phone down and ring their bank back then don't clear down the connection so the mark dials out with no dialtone and starts talking to the same scammers thinking they are talking to their bank?

I am sure that a scammer could play a recording of a dial tone if they wanted to do so.

The existing guidance of leave a time gap & call someone else first still applies.

If you want to hear the dial tone press the off-hook key on a DECT handset before dialling (at least if paired to the supplied Fritz!box).
I also have my Fritz!box options set to light up the function LED on the router when a handset connects for dialling (or incoming).

If you dial before pressing the off-hook key it still previews the number but there may not be any simulated tones until you press the off-hook key to place the call. I prefer to preview the number on the display before I go off-hook.

Some other handsets are set to go off-hook or auto-answer as soon as lifted from a cradle and auto-hangup when placed back in the cradle. In that case it is usually an option in the handset's local settings.

While other behaviours may be configured from the base settings.

It's more similar to mobile dialling in some ways.

If you have used a SIP phone they often work the same way as the number of digits that make a valid number depends on the dial plan, whether there are internal numbers and other short codes, and whether it has helper rules to add back a default area codes if the user tries to dial without it.

Edited by prlzx (Tue 20-Feb-24 18:05:49)

I recontracted my Dad's connection with PlusNet (been with them 20+ years and phone line for last 5 or 6) last year, he has kept his line and just carries on as normal. We upgraded from ADSL to FTTC as it was cheaper.

I know the time will come where we will have to look at the voice side of things but will deal with that then, the router is upstairs and the phone socket is downstairs so will requre some work to sort cabling out as is all around the existing setup. I want to port his number out but PlusNet do not have a process for that at the moment without cancelling the package. I'd like to move it over with my Andrews & Arnold one.

I agree with that. When I first set up Zen's DV I plugged an old analogue phone into the Fritz FON port, and this gave an immediate dial tone.

In reply to a post by chris52:

I am sure that a scammer could play a recording of a dial tone if they wanted to do so.

That wasn't the point I was making. If the user is on a system where a dial tone is not generated then they will be at risk of assuming that no dial tone means normal dial out procedure. That is where the scammers have the opportunity.