VOIP cable quality problem ?

[hermx]

Just joined Vodaphone so I had to move from conventional copper-wired landline to VOIP.  I tested the line by connecting my phone (tone dialler) to the phone output of the router - labelled phone1 - with filters suggested by Jayach (I think) from this forum. No problem phone works.

The cable attached to the phone is about 4 ft long. However as soon as I connected the phone to a previously working cable, about 30 ft in length the ring tone vanished. The phone stopped working.

I checked connections and continuity multiple times - nothing worked. The 30 ft extension is a flat stranded cable, not a twisted pair - but it did use to work.

Any suggestion from more knowledgeable members ?  TIA.

[Jayach]

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@hermx wrote:

The cable attached to the phone is about 4 ft long. However as soon as I connected the phone to a previously working cable, about 30 ft in length the ring tone vanished. The phone stopped working.

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So does the phone work, apart from the ring, or is it completely dead?

As the TEL ports are only providing an analogue phone signal it doesn't need to be twisted pair, so a flat cable is fine, and the length shouldn't matter.

There are only two pins on the TEL connectors, so if the phone works via the so-called "VoIP adapter", then adding a phone extension cable should still work, unless the extension cable is faulty.

[CrimsonLiar]

I'd suspect the culprit is voltage drop with the "real" landline having higher voltages and the VOIP line providing just enough power and no more - which is probably not enough for a 30-foot extension cable!

[Jayach]

I very much doubt that. There has been a previous poster on here who has connected the TEL output to the original extension wiring, and had multiple old style phones (so old they had rotary dials, and no the rotary dials didn't work) without problems, so a 30ft extension cable should be no problem.

We really need to know a bit more about how it fails when the extension cable is in use.

[hermx]

Thank you for the amazingly quick replies.

@CrimsonLiar   I believe the REN on the Vodafone VOIP line is 3. That's why I hadn't thought initially that the cable was the problem. For some reason it is difficult to get any technical details about virtually anything from ISPs .

@Jayach  I am not sure what you're referring to when you  write you "need to know a bit more about how it fails when the extension cable is in use" given that I experimented with various possible connection patterns and tested continuity, though, of course, it got me thinking about what I might have missed.

[Ripshod]

In these cases I think the extension cable really needs to be twisted pair to reduce interference. 

[Jayach]

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@hermx wrote:

@Jayach  I am not sure what you're referring to when you  write you "need to know a bit more about how it fails when the extension cable is in use"

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You wrote: 

@hermx wrote:

The cable attached to the phone is about 4 ft long. However as soon as I connected the phone to a previously working cable, about 30 ft in length the ring tone vanished. The phone stopped working.

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I misunderstood when you said the ring tone vanished to mean it didn't ring, so I queried what you meant by the phone stopped working.

You obviously meant the dial tone vanished and the phone stopped working. My mistake.

If when using the extension cable, it is still connected to the "VoIP adapter" (I hate that name) and is just a normal telephone extension cable with BT type connectors on either end, then I can only presume it is faulty. Have you tried with another cable?

[Cynric]

Was the 30' cable opened out or coiled when you tested it? I'd also go for voltage drop as we haven't much info on Vodafone's routers and what power they supply to the handset. You could plug-in a DECT base station.