VOIP between phones in my house?

[Matt Meiser]

I'm not even sure where to start looking for something like this on the web and I know we've got a few telecom people here so...

Right now we use a 5.8GHz phone system with a remote in the shop. It works OK about 80% of the time as long as I stand right by the door. Further, it cuts out. And I can't hear the ringer over machines.

I've already got a steady 54mbps wireless connection between the two. What would be really cool is to put a box in the house that plugs into the phones and into my network. Put a matching box in the shop, plugged into the switch out there. Then plug a conventional phone and a bell-type ringer which I already have into that.

It seems like some open source software and two used Vonage boxes could do it, but I couldn't find anything. I know about Asterisk, but that seems overly complicated for my needs and I think would require some expensive hardware or multiple servers.

I can't use a service like Packet8 or Vonage because my internet connection won't support them. It has to be completely self-contained.

I do have two phone lines, so to call house to shop, I could require that you call from one line to the other--so this could basically be an extension rather than a PBX-like system.

Does this exist?

[Curt Harms]

For the ringer problem I bought a box from Radio Shack designed for hard-of-hearing folks. It turns a light on when the phone rings.Can't help with the phone issue, sorry.

[Matt Meiser]

That's exactly what I have Curt--but no phone line out there.

[Mike Henderson]

Why not run wire out there? You could run an aerial line or bury it. It doesn't take much for a phone, just some twisted pair.

Mike

[Matt Meiser]

That's an option, but its about 150' straight-line and there's no good way to get it out of the house without either having to get it under the deck or cross the septic field, which also makes it further. Since I've already invested the time and money in routers and antennae to get a solid wireless connection, I'd like to use that. If I went overhead, it would be a major lightning magnet by the time I got it high enough to cross the yard, which would take some poles.

[paul cottingham]

If you are interested in Asterisk (and seriously, who isn't?) check out pbxinaflash.com. We rolled those boxes out and for your situation it would be simple. You could even turn it in a virtual machine, and run it on an existing box. It will do intercom as well. There is even a distro out there that will run in a wireless router.

but I warn you, it is not for the faint of heart, AND telephony is at least as addictive as woodworking.

[Art Mulder]

you have wireless, so you have a pc in the shop? Hmm, you'd think some skype-like solution would work here, but I'm not up on that.

[Matt Meiser]

Yes, but I can't use anything that routes the VOIP traffic off my LAN. What would be ideal is a box that plugs into any old phone jack and looks like a phone. Then it would connect to my network and talk to box 2. Box 2 would have a POTS jack which I could plug my phone and ringer into.

Basically like those boxes that run a phone line over the power lines (maybe one of those would even work, now that I think of it) but instead of going over the power lines, over my LAN.

[Doug Shepard]

If you have land lines in both locations there may be another way. My dad used to work for the phone company and knew a few tricks but there was something called ringback that the old phone installers would use to test the service after installing phones. It was either a 4 or 5 digit number that when dialed (then the phone hung up) would cause all the phones in the house to ring. Once the ringing stopped it meant someone had picked up then the dialer could also pick up and voila - cheapskate intercom service. I'll have to ask him if he remembers what that dialing number was.

[David G Baker]

Matt,
I have one of those devices that use AC lines for extending telephone service. It works great inside of my house but my pole barn is 190 or so feet from the house and the service does not work well at all.
Doug,
I remember doing the 4 or 5 digit numbers to make the other phones ring but I haven't heard of that option being available in many years. It may still exist but I don't recall the numbers to dial. Maybe someone else on SMC can help in this areal

[Larry Browning]

I have the same situation as Matt, except I do have a land line in my shop. However I guess I am just too dumb to figure out how to take advantage of that. Do they make a consumer phone that allows you to call other phones in the house? sort of like a pbx system? How is this done?

[Jim Becker]

Matt, the "stuff" you need to make this work does exist, but the ATAs (VoIP adapters) are not super inexpensive and are not typically aimed at "residential/consumer" use. I believe Netgear makes a small gateway that would allow you to use inexpensive SIP phones and have access to your analog phone line, for example. MultiTech also has single analog to Ethernet adapters, but if you could get two of them to just talk together it would still cost you nearly $700 for the two of them. And that may not be enough without some additional gear, such as the Asterix server you mentioned, even though technically, SIP phones do most of the work internal to themselves.

There are some very small "small business" IP phone system setups that would likely support this, too, but they would be costly.

I suggest you look for the "telephone anywhere" adapters that use your power lines to extend a phone remotely.

[paul cottingham]

I have the same situation as Matt, except I do have a land line in my shop. However I guess I am just too dumb to figure out how to take advantage of that. Do they make a consumer phone that allows you to call other phones in the house? sort of like a pbx system? How is this done?

I can be done, but it can be tricky. ATA's can be expensive, and definitely can be tough to configure. BUT it can be done with a turnkey distro like PBXinaFlash. Linksys sells some IP phones in the $100 dollar range, but they kinda suck. There are lots of good $200 dollar phones available. But be warned...it'll turn into another fascinating (and potentially expensive) hobby.

[Larry Browning]

I can be done, but it can be tricky. ATA's can be expensive, and definitely can be tough to configure. BUT it can be done with a turnkey distro like PBXinaFlash. Linksys sells some IP phones in the $100 dollar range, but they kinda suck. There are lots of good $200 dollar phones available. But be warned...it'll turn into another fascinating (and potentially expensive) hobby.

Ok, let me clarify things. I will spend no more than $50 on this. Cause, quite frankly, having a phone connection from the shop to the house is not so much for me, but for SWMBO to get in touch with me, not the other way round. And usually, she wants me to come up to the house for something, requiring me to leave the shop. Why would I want to spend shop money on something like that?
I was thinking if there was a simple and CHEAP way of doing this, I might be interested.

[Larry Browning]

Why not run wire out there? You could run an aerial line or bury it. It doesn't take much for a phone, just some twisted pair.

Mike
How does this work? I do have a phone line running from the house to the shop, but then what?

[paul cottingham]

Ok, let me clarify things. I will spend no more than $50 on this. Cause, quite frankly, having a phone connection from the shop to the house is not so much for me, but for SWMBO to get in touch with me, not the other way round. And usually, she wants me to come up to the house for something, requiring me to leave the shop. Why would I want to spend shop money on something like that?
I was thinking if there was a simple and CHEAP way of doing this, I might be interested.
I kind of figured that. I don't really think there is a cheap way to do what you want, short of using donated equipment. Or you could run viop in a virtual machine, the expensive part would be the ATA (the phone line to computer interface.)
Just my opinion.

[Matt Meiser]

OK, you guys gave me some key words to search on and I found a couple posts on the Linksys/Cisco user forums on using 2 of their SPA3102 Voice Gateways to accomplish exactly what I want to do. They are about $70 each on Newegg. Apparently there's a slightly cheaper device, the PAP2T I could also use on the shop end. I don't want to use a standalone IP phone on that end because I want to use the bell ringer. I need to check what the Ringer Equivalency Number of that is though to see if it will even work.

I did realize that there's a drawback for the house phone in that it would require dialing 9 to get an outside line so I have to think about that (and more importantly discuss with SWMBO ;)). It might be better to just make it an extension of my office line, then we'd just call between the two lines to call between the house and shop. The only drawback would be not getting home calls routed out there, but honestly my wife is the one who calls out there the most.

If I end up pulling wire out there, I'll pull both phone lines and install a 2-line phone so we can call between house and shop through the telco.

[Art Mulder]

Right now we use a 5.8GHz phone system with a remote in the shop. It works OK about 80% of the time as long as I stand right by the door. Further, it cuts out. And I can't hear the ringer over machines.

Has this angle been totally exhausted?

Maybe this is obvious, but where is your base station in the house? Can you move the base station so that it is closer to your shop - OR - can you make sure the base station is on the 2nd floor so that it gets the best range and has the fewest walls to try and punch a signal through.

Not to mention just keeping your cell phone in your pocket set on "vibrate" should get it noticed even if a machine is on. Not quite as convenient, but if you already have it...

[Matt Meiser]

Art, the base station is about as close as it can get. It can actually "see" the shop through a window. The main problem isn't as much the range (as long as I stand near the door and stand still it works) as hearing the ringer which is already set as high as it will go. I bet I could fix the range issue by hacking the base and adding an external antenna.

I do usually take the cell phone out, but for whatever reason I don't feel them (different models over the years) vibrate all the time and still miss calls.

[Larry Browning]

Art, the base station is about as close as it can get. It can actually "see" the shop through a window. The main problem isn't as much the range (as long as I stand near the door and stand still it works) as hearing the ringer which is already set as high as it will go. I bet I could fix the range issue by hacking the base and adding an external antenna.

I do usually take the cell phone out, but for whatever reason I don't feel them (different models over the years) vibrate all the time and still miss calls.
Matt,
My cell phone is also set to vibrate, but I have learned I cannot take it down to the shop with me. I don't get that many calls on my cell phone, so every time it starts to ring, it scares the bajeebies out of me! This seems to me to be an unsafe situation if I am right in the middle of a cut on the TS or router table.
I have about decided to not pursue improving my communications with the house anyway. It just seems that everytime she call me, I have to go up to the house for something. From my point of view, this is not a good thing. I kinda like the excuse, "Sorry honey, I didn't hear the phone ring." If she really needs me, she can walk down to the shop and get me. She can do her own research if she wants to improve the communications between the shop and house. Just a thought.

[paul cottingham]

I did realize that there's a drawback for the house phone in that it would require dialing 9 to get an outside line so I have to think about that (and more importantly discuss with SWMBO ;)). It might be better to just make it an extension of my office line, then we'd just call between the two lines to call between the house and shop. The only drawback would be not getting home calls routed out there, but honestly my wife is the one who calls out there the most.

If I end up pulling wire out there, I'll pull both phone lines and install a 2-line phone so we can call between house and shop through the telco.

You should be able to change the dial plan so you don't need to dial 9 first. I would make sure that all you need is the one linksys gateway. You will also need 2 voip phones as well. if you order cheap ones, make sure you can return them, as the sound of some of them is terrible.

[Matt Meiser]

Matt,
My cell phone is also set to vibrate, but I have learned I cannot take it down to the shop with me. I don't get that many calls on my cell phone, so every time it starts to ring, it scares the bajeebies out of me! This seems to me to be an unsafe situation if I am right in the middle of a cut on the TS or router table.

I think my problem is that I've gotten too used to it. I've have pagers and then cell phones since about 1996 that vibrate. After having a pager go off just as I was reaching into control panels enough times during the first several years, I learned not to flinch!

Paul, you are saying have a VOIP phone in the house to use to call the shop? And set up the ATA so that it calls the VOIP phones when there's an incoming call? The only drawback to that would be the ringer issue.

[paul cottingham]

If I understand what you are describing, yes that is what you need. Many Voip phones have light indicators when they ring, BTW.

[Jim Becker]

You should be able to change the dial plan so you don't need to dial 9 first. I would make sure that all you need is the one linksys gateway. You will also need 2 voip phones as well. if you order cheap ones, make sure you can return them, as the sound of some of them is terrible.

Agree on the dial-9 issue, as long as the system chosen allows for digit insertion/dial plan modification.

Matt doesn't necessarily need VoIP phones as he's been looking at IP-Analog gateway devices.

[Matt Meiser]

As an update to this thread, I ended up running copper phone line to the shop since we got natural gas this summer and had a contractor out with a trencher to run the gas line to the shop. I ran two 1-1/2" conduits, one communication cabling and one for future use.

Since we have two phone lines, home and office, I ran both and protocol will be for my family to call my office line if they need me. Caller ID will prevent me from answering work calls that I want to go to voicemail on a Saturday. ;) I got a really nice 2-line phone off Ebay and a couple LOUD ringers with flashers so I'll be able to see which line is ringing.