drears@pica.army.mil (Dennis G Rears) (03/23/91)
machine? I now it sounds simple but they are not available here. Is
there any way I can convert a one line phone to handle both lines?
dennis zellich@stl-07sima.army.mil (Rich Zellich) (03/27/91)
Go down to Radio Schlock and buy a two-line answering machine adapter. It will allow the machine to pick up on whichever line of a pair rings first, and will ignore the second if they both receive calls at the same time. It cheerfully switches between lines as calls come in on either of them, and can also be used with a phone if you are willing to call out on whichever line \received/ the last call. I think it runs about $20, but it may be a little higher or lower; it's been a while since I bought mine (and that was on sale, anyway) so I don't remember. The little box works fine, and causes no problem with loss of ringer voltage (as did, unfortunately, the other RS box that cuts off the answering machine when any extension is picked up). Cheers, Rich
irvin@northstar105.dartmouth.edu (Tim Irvin) (03/27/91)
In TELECOM Digest V11 #243, Rich Zellich writes: > Go down to Radio Schlock and buy a two-line answering machine adapter. > It will allow the machine to pick up on whichever line of a pair rings > first, and will ignore the second if they both receive calls at the > same time. > It cheerfully switches between lines as calls come in on either of > them, and can also be used with a phone if you are willing to call out > on whichever line \received/ the last call. > I think it runs about $20, but it may be a little higher or lower; > it's been a while since I bought mine (and that was on sale, anyway) > so I don't remember. The little box works fine, and causes no problem > with loss of ringer voltage (as did, unfortunately, the other RS box > that cuts off the answering machine when any extension is picked up). I bought one of these for my father once. He lived in a town with an old crossbar switch. It worked like a champ. But then one day Southern Bell decided to put in a new switch (actually the town had been screaming for one since we were the only people in the area who couldn't get Call Waiting, et al.) Anyway, as soon as the new switch came, the answering machine adapter stopped working. It appeared to get stuck between the two lines and both lines would go off-hook. So, I swiped the box from my dad and am using it here, it works great on my current switch. Actually, I never did like the new switch they put in my fathers area. It always gave to feel of some cheap made in Taiwan product. Some of the things I didn't like about it were: - The dial tone didn't sound quite right, can't really describe it, but just not quite right. - The dial tone wouldn't break until after the first tone was finished, i.e. you take your finger off the button. - A caller would hear one complete ring cycle, before the phones in the house would start to ring, so we got many people hanging up before we could get to the phone. I have no idea what type of switch it was, or who made it. I just know that it gave the impression of being a bargain basement piece of equipment. Which actually didn't surprise me since there were only a couple of businesses serviced by this switch, and the rest was residential, it obviously was a money loser for SBT. Tim Irvin