The lower quality segment of your configuration will not affect the other
phones MOST of the time. If somebody is on the noisy line in the bathroom
and somebody from the quiet/clean/cat5 office joins in the conversation, the
person in the office will hear the noise.

"CMF" wrote in message
...
Hello all.

I am practicing what I preach from an Intelligent Home/Structured Wiring
perspective and upgrading the low voltage wiring in my house getting it
ready for a probable sale. New CAT5e for all phones, LAN, and RG6Q for the
cable, etc.

My question is, and I know I should know this, but if I knew everything I
wouldn't have to sell the house.

The old phone line is CAT2. I have one phone in particular in the bathroom
upstairs (no jokes) that I cannot get to the top cap or even remotely
close
to replace the wiring. My initial plan is to just eliminate that jack, do
a
sheetrock repair and be done with it. However, I can get to the original
wire from the attic, and could run a splice to it from the central phone
location. Question is, does the quality of this line bring the quality of
the entire installation down, or does the fact that it will be a single
end
run from the central location to the phone isolate the other lines from a
quality perspective? I really don't think there is anything wrong with the
line, and I will spice into it with new CAT5e as close to the jack as I
can,
but there will still be some of the old wire in place.

Thoughts? I realize many of you will think this is overkill and a waste of
time and money, but I'm doing it anyway, so please leave those responses
off. Thanks in advance,

--
Maury French

Wylie, TX
"I cannot teach my kids ethics if I do not
practice them myself"

elect --fish tap wire --or see if the old wire can move --tir the cat 5 to
the cat 2 and pull the new in.
"CMF" wrote in message
...
Hello all.

I am practicing what I preach from an Intelligent Home/Structured Wiring
perspective and upgrading the low voltage wiring in my house getting it
ready for a probable sale. New CAT5e for all phones, LAN, and RG6Q for the
cable, etc.

My question is, and I know I should know this, but if I knew everything I
wouldn't have to sell the house.

The old phone line is CAT2. I have one phone in particular in the bathroom
upstairs (no jokes) that I cannot get to the top cap or even remotely
close
to replace the wiring. My initial plan is to just eliminate that jack, do
a
sheetrock repair and be done with it. However, I can get to the original
wire from the attic, and could run a splice to it from the central phone
location. Question is, does the quality of this line bring the quality of
the entire installation down, or does the fact that it will be a single
end
run from the central location to the phone isolate the other lines from a
quality perspective? I really don't think there is anything wrong with the
line, and I will spice into it with new CAT5e as close to the jack as I
can,
but there will still be some of the old wire in place.

Thoughts? I realize many of you will think this is overkill and a waste of
time and money, but I'm doing it anyway, so please leave those responses
off. Thanks in advance,

--
Maury French

Wylie, TX
"I cannot teach my kids ethics if I do not
practice them myself"

elect --fish tap wire --or see if the old wire can move --tir the cat 5 to
the cat 2 and pull the new in.
"CMF" wrote in message
...
Hello all.

I am practicing what I preach from an Intelligent Home/Structured Wiring
perspective and upgrading the low voltage wiring in my house getting it
ready for a probable sale. New CAT5e for all phones, LAN, and RG6Q for the
cable, etc.

My question is, and I know I should know this, but if I knew everything I
wouldn't have to sell the house.

The old phone line is CAT2. I have one phone in particular in the bathroom
upstairs (no jokes) that I cannot get to the top cap or even remotely
close
to replace the wiring. My initial plan is to just eliminate that jack, do
a
sheetrock repair and be done with it. However, I can get to the original
wire from the attic, and could run a splice to it from the central phone
location. Question is, does the quality of this line bring the quality of
the entire installation down, or does the fact that it will be a single
end
run from the central location to the phone isolate the other lines from a
quality perspective? I really don't think there is anything wrong with the
line, and I will spice into it with new CAT5e as close to the jack as I
can,
but there will still be some of the old wire in place.

Thoughts? I realize many of you will think this is overkill and a waste of
time and money, but I'm doing it anyway, so please leave those responses
off. Thanks in advance,

--
Maury French

Wylie, TX
"I cannot teach my kids ethics if I do not
practice them myself"

"Joe" wrote in message
...
elect --fish tap wire --or see if the old wire can move --tir the cat 5 to
the cat 2 and pull the new in.

Been there. The existing wire is stapled, and the location of the phone
makes it next to impossible to get to. The bathroom is upstairs, and the
little cutout for the toilet where the phone is is right in the corner of
the house. While nothing is impossible, I will have to be pretty bored to
get any more agressive. I have done some face down in insulation while
holding a drill with a right angle attachment at extended arms length with
roofing nails poking me in the head and arms before, but I was getting paid
for it. Not really wanting to do that here.

"Joe" wrote in message
...
elect --fish tap wire --or see if the old wire can move --tir the cat 5 to
the cat 2 and pull the new in.

Been there. The existing wire is stapled, and the location of the phone
makes it next to impossible to get to. The bathroom is upstairs, and the
little cutout for the toilet where the phone is is right in the corner of
the house. While nothing is impossible, I will have to be pretty bored to
get any more agressive. I have done some face down in insulation while
holding a drill with a right angle attachment at extended arms length with
roofing nails poking me in the head and arms before, but I was getting paid
for it. Not really wanting to do that here.

In alt.home.repair on Tue, 29 Jul 2003 12:29:42 GMT "CMF"
posted:

Hello all.

I am practicing what I preach from an Intelligent Home/Structured Wiring
perspective and upgrading the low voltage wiring in my house getting it
ready for a probable sale. New CAT5e for all phones, LAN, and RG6Q for the
cable, etc.

My question is, and I know I should know this, but if I knew everything I
wouldn't have to sell the house.

The old phone line is CAT2. I have one phone in particular in the bathroom
upstairs (no jokes) that I cannot get to the top cap or even remotely close
to replace the wiring. My initial plan is to just eliminate that jack, do a
sheetrock repair and be done with it.

No. no. What is so bad about CAT2 that it has to be expunged like
this? An outlet in the bathroom is an asset. I have one.

However, I can get to the original
wire from the attic, and could run a splice to it from the central phone
location. Question is, does the quality of this line bring the quality of
the entire installation down, or does the fact that it will be a single end

I don't think it hurts the installation, nor do I think the current
outlet hurts the rest of the house. Only when two phones are in use
at the same time on the same line, one in the bathroom, might the
quality come down.

run from the central location to the phone isolate the other lines from a
quality perspective? I really don't think there is anything wrong with the
line, and I will spice into it with new CAT5e as close to the jack as I can,
but there will still be some of the old wire in place.

Thoughts? I realize many of you will think this is overkill and a waste of
time and money, but I'm doing it anyway, so please leave those responses
off. Thanks in advance,

I don't object to your upgrading things, only to your degrading
things.

Meirman

If emailing, please let me know whether
or not you are posting the same letter.

Change domain to erols.com, if necessary.

In alt.home.repair on Tue, 29 Jul 2003 12:29:42 GMT "CMF"
posted:

Hello all.

I am practicing what I preach from an Intelligent Home/Structured Wiring
perspective and upgrading the low voltage wiring in my house getting it
ready for a probable sale. New CAT5e for all phones, LAN, and RG6Q for the
cable, etc.

My question is, and I know I should know this, but if I knew everything I
wouldn't have to sell the house.

The old phone line is CAT2. I have one phone in particular in the bathroom
upstairs (no jokes) that I cannot get to the top cap or even remotely close
to replace the wiring. My initial plan is to just eliminate that jack, do a
sheetrock repair and be done with it.

No. no. What is so bad about CAT2 that it has to be expunged like
this? An outlet in the bathroom is an asset. I have one.

However, I can get to the original
wire from the attic, and could run a splice to it from the central phone
location. Question is, does the quality of this line bring the quality of
the entire installation down, or does the fact that it will be a single end

I don't think it hurts the installation, nor do I think the current
outlet hurts the rest of the house. Only when two phones are in use
at the same time on the same line, one in the bathroom, might the
quality come down.

run from the central location to the phone isolate the other lines from a
quality perspective? I really don't think there is anything wrong with the
line, and I will spice into it with new CAT5e as close to the jack as I can,
but there will still be some of the old wire in place.

Thoughts? I realize many of you will think this is overkill and a waste of
time and money, but I'm doing it anyway, so please leave those responses
off. Thanks in advance,

I don't object to your upgrading things, only to your degrading
things.

Meirman

If emailing, please let me know whether
or not you are posting the same letter.

Change domain to erols.com, if necessary.

In alt.home.repair on Tue, 29 Jul 2003 14:16:55 GMT "CMF"
posted:


"B" wrote in message
r.com...
The lower quality segment of your configuration will not affect the other
phones MOST of the time. If somebody is on the noisy line in the bathroom
and somebody from the quiet/clean/cat5 office joins in the conversation,
the
person in the office will hear the noise.

Thanks. Considering this particular phone is more of a novelty than a highly
used phone, that should not be a problem. I mean, most people when, uh,
sitting there do not really want to be on the phone anyway..

What else have they got to do? And some calls are important. And it
is particularly difficult to go answer a phone in another room at a
time like that.

I put my phone between my toilet and bathtub. (When in the bath, I
answer between rings, when the voltage is low.) In my house and
before, in my 5th floor apartment. (In that case I just ran the wire
out one window and in the bathroom window. Worked fine until I moved.)



Meirman

If emailing, please let me know whether
or not you are posting the same letter.

Change domain to erols.com, if necessary.

In alt.home.repair on Tue, 29 Jul 2003 14:16:55 GMT "CMF"
posted:


"B" wrote in message
r.com...
The lower quality segment of your configuration will not affect the other
phones MOST of the time. If somebody is on the noisy line in the bathroom
and somebody from the quiet/clean/cat5 office joins in the conversation,
the
person in the office will hear the noise.

Thanks. Considering this particular phone is more of a novelty than a highly
used phone, that should not be a problem. I mean, most people when, uh,
sitting there do not really want to be on the phone anyway..

What else have they got to do? And some calls are important. And it
is particularly difficult to go answer a phone in another room at a
time like that.

I put my phone between my toilet and bathtub. (When in the bath, I
answer between rings, when the voltage is low.) In my house and
before, in my 5th floor apartment. (In that case I just ran the wire
out one window and in the bathroom window. Worked fine until I moved.)



Meirman

If emailing, please let me know whether
or not you are posting the same letter.

Change domain to erols.com, if necessary.

"meirman" wrote in message
...

No. no. What is so bad about CAT2 that it has to be expunged like
this? An outlet in the bathroom is an asset. I have one.

Well, for one thing, our first phone in the b'room was an old ATT phone that
had a ringer from Hell that could not be turned off. The toilet is not a
place that I want to jump out of my skin on. Of course, it does give new
meaning to the term 'scared the s&*t out of me!"

Anyway, to answer the question about CAT2 and to address previous questions
about my using CAT5e for phones, I have a budding business installing
structured wiring systems. I have taken the Leviton training, and they
recommend CAT5 for everything that involves twisted pair, namely the phone
and LAN. While the bathroom location is not prime for multiple drops, most
are, and if you have say two drops of CAT5 at each wallplate location with
rj-45 jacks, you have the ability to use both lines as LAN if you desire.
Keep in mind all these lines run back to the Structured Media Center (SMC)
and you can change them from LAN to Phone easily, and vice-versa. A phone
plug fits nicely into an RJ-45 jack, as most of you know already, so why
not. And, even though the Intelligent Home and structured wiring concepts is
a slow market at least in the DFW area where I am, more and more people are
wanting these services. So, running CAT5e to all drops makes sense. And,
when buying in bulk as I do, the cost increase is insignificant.

Another benefit with running high quality wire from the demark all the way
to the SMC and each jack is the ability to snicker when the phone company
comes and tries to blame your wiring for a problem. They can run all the
tests they want, and the quality of the wiring from the Demarc on will never
be suspect, if installed correctly.

I don't think it hurts the installation, nor do I think the current
outlet hurts the rest of the house. Only when two phones are in use
at the same time on the same line, one in the bathroom, might the
quality come down.

Even though I have no quantitative evidence, I can say the better the line,
the less chance the less than stellar members of DSL support (no offense to
anyone, but if you are forced to read from a script and spend an hour
rebooting computers when a DSL modem should be up even without anything
connected, well....) cannot blame the wiring. I remember the threat from a
DSL support manager, after I had escalated a problem saying they would send
a tech out, but if the line was bad I would have to pay. I had already run a
distinct line for the DSL and tested it with a WireScope 350, and told her
to bring it on.

So, I would want to make sure the CAT2 with any possible gimmies and gotchas
in that particular line did not cause degradation to my cleaner CAT5e
installation.

I don't object to your upgrading things, only to your degrading
things.

Meirman

So, is your concern me degrading the CAT2, or the phone in the bathroom?
(smiley inserted here)

"meirman" wrote in message
...

No. no. What is so bad about CAT2 that it has to be expunged like
this? An outlet in the bathroom is an asset. I have one.

Well, for one thing, our first phone in the b'room was an old ATT phone that
had a ringer from Hell that could not be turned off. The toilet is not a
place that I want to jump out of my skin on. Of course, it does give new
meaning to the term 'scared the s&*t out of me!"

Anyway, to answer the question about CAT2 and to address previous questions
about my using CAT5e for phones, I have a budding business installing
structured wiring systems. I have taken the Leviton training, and they
recommend CAT5 for everything that involves twisted pair, namely the phone
and LAN. While the bathroom location is not prime for multiple drops, most
are, and if you have say two drops of CAT5 at each wallplate location with
rj-45 jacks, you have the ability to use both lines as LAN if you desire.
Keep in mind all these lines run back to the Structured Media Center (SMC)
and you can change them from LAN to Phone easily, and vice-versa. A phone
plug fits nicely into an RJ-45 jack, as most of you know already, so why
not. And, even though the Intelligent Home and structured wiring concepts is
a slow market at least in the DFW area where I am, more and more people are
wanting these services. So, running CAT5e to all drops makes sense. And,
when buying in bulk as I do, the cost increase is insignificant.

Another benefit with running high quality wire from the demark all the way
to the SMC and each jack is the ability to snicker when the phone company
comes and tries to blame your wiring for a problem. They can run all the
tests they want, and the quality of the wiring from the Demarc on will never
be suspect, if installed correctly.

I don't think it hurts the installation, nor do I think the current
outlet hurts the rest of the house. Only when two phones are in use
at the same time on the same line, one in the bathroom, might the
quality come down.

Even though I have no quantitative evidence, I can say the better the line,
the less chance the less than stellar members of DSL support (no offense to
anyone, but if you are forced to read from a script and spend an hour
rebooting computers when a DSL modem should be up even without anything
connected, well....) cannot blame the wiring. I remember the threat from a
DSL support manager, after I had escalated a problem saying they would send
a tech out, but if the line was bad I would have to pay. I had already run a
distinct line for the DSL and tested it with a WireScope 350, and told her
to bring it on.

So, I would want to make sure the CAT2 with any possible gimmies and gotchas
in that particular line did not cause degradation to my cleaner CAT5e
installation.

I don't object to your upgrading things, only to your degrading
things.

Meirman

So, is your concern me degrading the CAT2, or the phone in the bathroom?
(smiley inserted here)

In alt.home.repair on Wed, 30 Jul 2003 11:47:04 GMT "CMF"
posted:


I don't object to your upgrading things, only to your degrading
things.

Meirman

So, is your concern me degrading the CAT2, or the phone in the bathroom?
(smiley inserted here)

The phone in the bathroom. It's one of the best things I have, and I
would gladly sacrifice quality sometimes to keep it.

I can understand, given your background, why you care about this.
Most people don't know enough to care.

I didn't understand a lot of what you wrote, and since you know so
much more than I do about this, you might appreciate a story, or even
help me figure it out: My house is 24 years old. About 5 years ago,
there started humming on my phone line when I picked up the phone, so
much that I could not hear a dial tone, and neither dialing or
touching touch tone keys caused it to dial. (This is just 8? or 10?
pair wire coming into the house and to the two lines the builder
installed. 4-color wire for what I put in.)

I disconnnected all the phones and accessories except one and still
had the problem. I disconnected that one and connected another and
still had it. Then I disconnected the two phone lines I had put in
(one because the previous owner put a second wall over the phone jack
in my bedroom, and I couldnt find it.)

I was ready to start on the two that the builder put in, but with less
than millimeter of extra wire beyond the squeeze connector (what do
you call it. Like a fork you push the wire between the tines), I was
afraid I wouldn't get it back together. I'd been without a phone for
a day or so, so I ran a wire from a second floor bedroom window to the
phone company interface downstairs outside. I only had the phone by
my desk and I ran a wire down the hall to my bedroom.

Busy with other things, I went for a year that way, until a neighbor
complained. I put it back the original way, and everything was fine.

Then a year later it happened again, and I went back to the outside
wire. This time it was a year or two, but when I was using the
inhouse wires, my 56K modem broke, and when I had to go to the outside
wires, I got better connection speeds with a 33K than I had gotten
with the 56K when I went through the house wires. I think I had only
gotten 28000 with the 56K but was getting 33333 with the 33 and the
outside line.

I didn't want to go back to the house lines, even if they worked for
the phone, but I tried them after two years and they work. And they
work well. I got 49,333 and 50,666 connections, and later it went up
usually to 51,333.


What's going on?


I'm slightly suspicious of the wall-phone connections in the kitchen,
which use those fork-tine-squeeze-things. Should I take them apart
and solder all 4 wires there? But I think there is more to it, partly
since I didn't touch them and it keeps not working, then working.

--

Also, given my situation, so far from CAT5 I'm not even close, do you
see a problem with using the yellow and black wires, or whatever color
they are, to take output from my computer sound card and run it to the
other rooms, where I will have small amplifiers with speakers so I can
listen to web-radio in all my rooms? I'll be careful not to overload
the sound card (and if worse comes to worse I can use the one a friend
gave me or buy another) but I wonder if there is some other issue I
have totally forgotten about.

Thanks a lot.


Meirman

If emailing, please let me know whether
or not you are posting the same letter.

Change domain to erols.com, if necessary.

In alt.home.repair on Wed, 30 Jul 2003 11:47:04 GMT "CMF"
posted:


I don't object to your upgrading things, only to your degrading
things.

Meirman

So, is your concern me degrading the CAT2, or the phone in the bathroom?
(smiley inserted here)

The phone in the bathroom. It's one of the best things I have, and I
would gladly sacrifice quality sometimes to keep it.

I can understand, given your background, why you care about this.
Most people don't know enough to care.

I didn't understand a lot of what you wrote, and since you know so
much more than I do about this, you might appreciate a story, or even
help me figure it out: My house is 24 years old. About 5 years ago,
there started humming on my phone line when I picked up the phone, so
much that I could not hear a dial tone, and neither dialing or
touching touch tone keys caused it to dial. (This is just 8? or 10?
pair wire coming into the house and to the two lines the builder
installed. 4-color wire for what I put in.)

I disconnnected all the phones and accessories except one and still
had the problem. I disconnected that one and connected another and
still had it. Then I disconnected the two phone lines I had put in
(one because the previous owner put a second wall over the phone jack
in my bedroom, and I couldnt find it.)

I was ready to start on the two that the builder put in, but with less
than millimeter of extra wire beyond the squeeze connector (what do
you call it. Like a fork you push the wire between the tines), I was
afraid I wouldn't get it back together. I'd been without a phone for
a day or so, so I ran a wire from a second floor bedroom window to the
phone company interface downstairs outside. I only had the phone by
my desk and I ran a wire down the hall to my bedroom.

Busy with other things, I went for a year that way, until a neighbor
complained. I put it back the original way, and everything was fine.

Then a year later it happened again, and I went back to the outside
wire. This time it was a year or two, but when I was using the
inhouse wires, my 56K modem broke, and when I had to go to the outside
wires, I got better connection speeds with a 33K than I had gotten
with the 56K when I went through the house wires. I think I had only
gotten 28000 with the 56K but was getting 33333 with the 33 and the
outside line.

I didn't want to go back to the house lines, even if they worked for
the phone, but I tried them after two years and they work. And they
work well. I got 49,333 and 50,666 connections, and later it went up
usually to 51,333.


What's going on?


I'm slightly suspicious of the wall-phone connections in the kitchen,
which use those fork-tine-squeeze-things. Should I take them apart
and solder all 4 wires there? But I think there is more to it, partly
since I didn't touch them and it keeps not working, then working.

--

Also, given my situation, so far from CAT5 I'm not even close, do you
see a problem with using the yellow and black wires, or whatever color
they are, to take output from my computer sound card and run it to the
other rooms, where I will have small amplifiers with speakers so I can
listen to web-radio in all my rooms? I'll be careful not to overload
the sound card (and if worse comes to worse I can use the one a friend
gave me or buy another) but I wonder if there is some other issue I
have totally forgotten about.

Thanks a lot.


Meirman

If emailing, please let me know whether
or not you are posting the same letter.

Change domain to erols.com, if necessary.

In alt.home.repair on Wed, 30 Jul 2003 13:26:18 GMT "CMF"
posted:

"meirman" wrote in message
.. .
In alt.home.repair on Wed, 30 Jul 2003 11:47:04 GMT "CMF"
posted:

I disconnnected all the phones and accessories except one and still
had the problem. I disconnected that one and connected another and
still had it. Then I disconnected the two phone lines I had put in
(one because the previous owner put a second wall over the phone jack
in my bedroom, and I couldnt find it.)

I was ready to start on the two that the builder put in, but with less
than millimeter of extra wire beyond the squeeze connector (what do
you call it. Like a fork you push the wire between the tines), I was
afraid I wouldn't get it back together. I'd been without a phone for
a day or so, so I ran a wire from a second floor bedroom window to the
phone company interface downstairs outside. I only had the phone by
my desk and I ran a wire down the hall to my bedroom.

Busy with other things, I went for a year that way, until a neighbor
complained. I put it back the original way, and everything was fine.

Then a year later it happened again, and I went back to the outside
wire. This time it was a year or two, but when I was using the
inhouse wires, my 56K modem broke, and when I had to go to the outside
wires, I got better connection speeds with a 33K than I had gotten
with the 56K when I went through the house wires. I think I had only
gotten 28000 with the 56K but was getting 33333 with the 33 and the
outside line.

I didn't want to go back to the house lines, even if they worked for
the phone, but I tried them after two years and they work. And they
work well. I got 49,333 and 50,666 connections, and later it went up
usually to 51,333.


What's going on?


I'm slightly suspicious of the wall-phone connections in the kitchen,
which use those fork-tine-squeeze-things. Should I take them apart
and solder all 4 wires there? But I think there is more to it, partly
since I didn't touch them and it keeps not working, then working.

--

Also, given my situation, so far from CAT5 I'm not even close, do you
see a problem with using the yellow and black wires, or whatever color
they are, to take output from my computer sound card and run it to the
other rooms, where I will have small amplifiers with speakers so I can
listen to web-radio in all my rooms? I'll be careful not to overload
the sound card (and if worse comes to worse I can use the one a friend
gave me or buy another) but I wonder if there is some other issue I
have totally forgotten about.

Thanks a lot.


Mr. Meirman,

I have forwarded this to myself in order to look more in depth on it. I
would love a digital picture of that fork thing (I'm guessing punchdown of
some kind but I can't figure what it would be doing on a kitchen phone) if

Sorry, I don't have a digital camera. It's not in the phone but the
Bell Telephone or Western Electric wall plate for a phone. The ones
with the two silver colored or aluminum studs that one can hang a
phone on, even many aftermarket phones and phonemachine/phones.

I'm not sure if the wall plates they sell in Radio Shack have that
same squeeze-between-the-tines connector, or some other kind.

The tines are really flat sheet metal, connected at one end like a
fork, but a quarter inch wide or more while the slots are much
narrower, the width of the wire. You push the insulated wire in and
the metal cuts through the insulation.

Next time there are problems I will solder the connections, but want
to wait until there are problems, so I can have a better idea if that
was the problem.

I still don't think they shorted (It's arranged like a big sideways H
with red/green/black/yellow in separate legs of the H. How could it
short, how could it keep the phones not on that line from working?

Maybe it was the phone company all along? Nothing I did? Could the
phone company leave me humming for a whole day? I can't remember if I
called repair or not. I've been making a lot of mistakes lately.

you can take one. And, I bet the gauge on that black/yellow wire is way to
small for sound. I don't suppose you are in the DFW area by any small
chance? I would love to take a look at your setup. I am out in Wide Awake
Wylie, TX.

My brother is. Does that help? I coudl stop by when I come to
visit, probably in the fall.

Boy, you guys in Texas think distances are nothing. Is that U shaped
lake I see near you the one I see from the plane? No wait, I zoomed
out and you're only 6 miles from my brother.

Maury



Meirman

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In alt.home.repair on Wed, 30 Jul 2003 13:26:18 GMT "CMF"
posted:

"meirman" wrote in message
.. .
In alt.home.repair on Wed, 30 Jul 2003 11:47:04 GMT "CMF"
posted:

I disconnnected all the phones and accessories except one and still
had the problem. I disconnected that one and connected another and
still had it. Then I disconnected the two phone lines I had put in
(one because the previous owner put a second wall over the phone jack
in my bedroom, and I couldnt find it.)

I was ready to start on the two that the builder put in, but with less
than millimeter of extra wire beyond the squeeze connector (what do
you call it. Like a fork you push the wire between the tines), I was
afraid I wouldn't get it back together. I'd been without a phone for
a day or so, so I ran a wire from a second floor bedroom window to the
phone company interface downstairs outside. I only had the phone by
my desk and I ran a wire down the hall to my bedroom.

Busy with other things, I went for a year that way, until a neighbor
complained. I put it back the original way, and everything was fine.

Then a year later it happened again, and I went back to the outside
wire. This time it was a year or two, but when I was using the
inhouse wires, my 56K modem broke, and when I had to go to the outside
wires, I got better connection speeds with a 33K than I had gotten
with the 56K when I went through the house wires. I think I had only
gotten 28000 with the 56K but was getting 33333 with the 33 and the
outside line.

I didn't want to go back to the house lines, even if they worked for
the phone, but I tried them after two years and they work. And they
work well. I got 49,333 and 50,666 connections, and later it went up
usually to 51,333.


What's going on?


I'm slightly suspicious of the wall-phone connections in the kitchen,
which use those fork-tine-squeeze-things. Should I take them apart
and solder all 4 wires there? But I think there is more to it, partly
since I didn't touch them and it keeps not working, then working.

--

Also, given my situation, so far from CAT5 I'm not even close, do you
see a problem with using the yellow and black wires, or whatever color
they are, to take output from my computer sound card and run it to the
other rooms, where I will have small amplifiers with speakers so I can
listen to web-radio in all my rooms? I'll be careful not to overload
the sound card (and if worse comes to worse I can use the one a friend
gave me or buy another) but I wonder if there is some other issue I
have totally forgotten about.

Thanks a lot.


Mr. Meirman,

I have forwarded this to myself in order to look more in depth on it. I
would love a digital picture of that fork thing (I'm guessing punchdown of
some kind but I can't figure what it would be doing on a kitchen phone) if

Sorry, I don't have a digital camera. It's not in the phone but the
Bell Telephone or Western Electric wall plate for a phone. The ones
with the two silver colored or aluminum studs that one can hang a
phone on, even many aftermarket phones and phonemachine/phones.

I'm not sure if the wall plates they sell in Radio Shack have that
same squeeze-between-the-tines connector, or some other kind.

The tines are really flat sheet metal, connected at one end like a
fork, but a quarter inch wide or more while the slots are much
narrower, the width of the wire. You push the insulated wire in and
the metal cuts through the insulation.

Next time there are problems I will solder the connections, but want
to wait until there are problems, so I can have a better idea if that
was the problem.

I still don't think they shorted (It's arranged like a big sideways H
with red/green/black/yellow in separate legs of the H. How could it
short, how could it keep the phones not on that line from working?

Maybe it was the phone company all along? Nothing I did? Could the
phone company leave me humming for a whole day? I can't remember if I
called repair or not. I've been making a lot of mistakes lately.

you can take one. And, I bet the gauge on that black/yellow wire is way to
small for sound. I don't suppose you are in the DFW area by any small
chance? I would love to take a look at your setup. I am out in Wide Awake
Wylie, TX.

My brother is. Does that help? I coudl stop by when I come to
visit, probably in the fall.

Boy, you guys in Texas think distances are nothing. Is that U shaped
lake I see near you the one I see from the plane? No wait, I zoomed
out and you're only 6 miles from my brother.

Maury



Meirman

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