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Can I use a fax machine with a VOIP phone?

44K views 39 replies 30 participants last post by  JamesK 
#1 ·
I searched but maybe I'm using the wrong terms, but as above can I use a fax machine with a VOIP phone?
 
#4 ·
I know it works on Vonage. Our office has had a Vonage fax line for quite some time, which connects into an iMac which we use to recieve incoming faxes. The iMac fax recieving software has some issues, but the line works just fine. We also use the computer for outgoing faxes too. Nothing like pasting a signature box on a .pdf and, voila, legal fax document.
 
#7 ·
I've used a modem on VoIP providers. It works.

Here's a geeky useful application:

I was in Toronto. Primus has a gateway number in Toronto that I can call to get a dialtone on my Talk Broadband service. So I set the dial # to dial the gateway, log into my account, get my Regina dialtone, and call my Regina ISP.

52kbps, but awful latency (800 ms). Still, good enough considering it cost me nothing to use at all.
 
#8 ·
I'm with Primus, and I've had no problems with faxing. In fact, my fax machine has worked better since switching. I was living in this townhouse in Montreal that must have had some pretty crummy wiring. I was with Bell at the time, and had to limit the bandwidth on my fax for incoming signals because I couldn't receive faxes. Sending faxes were no problem. Once I switched to Primus, I could use the full capacity of my fax machine in both directions.
 
#9 ·
Fax over VoIP - NOT Good !!!

My Bell VoIP was apparently NOT availble for fax, Bell said. So for my first 3 months in Ottawa I had faxes sent to my apartment's Bell landline.

Then someone at Bell tried to send faxes to me & they worked. The excellent Canon all-in-one MultiPass phone-in technicians said their units were not good with faxes.

So I bought a new Brother 240C (also one for my Winnipeg office but that's on an MTS landline), hoping that newer technology would be better. No difference, it seems. There are still occasional blanks or No Signals.

By now my clients & friends know I use one number for fax & phone. So they & I'll suffer along, not too bad since faxing is less used nowadays.

But I'd recommend a separate landline for faxes, or maybe Primus or Vonage's VoIP inclusive fax number, they said VoIP-configured for faxes. Denzil
 
#14 ·
It's set via the MyTBB online portal. I expect that Primus CS or TS could also set it for you. I believe that your account defaults to the high bandwidth codec, but I could be wrong about that.

By the way, simply having a lot of bandwidth is only good if there is little congestion. There are other issues that affect call quality (including faxing reliability) more than bandwidth.

Steve
 
#15 ·
For those interested, there are two different ways that VoIP devices handle faxes:
1) G711 passthrough - Since the high compression, low data rate codecs destroy the tones used for faxes and modems, the ATAdetects that the transmission is a fax/modem, it should automatically switch its codec to G711 from which ever codec it uses for voice calls (typically G729 or G723). G711 is a 64 kbps codec, once you add the ip overhead etc, you're looking at almost 100 kbps. The G711 is the same codec that telcos use to transfer voice calls along digital trunk lines.

2) T.38 (sometimes called Fax Relay) - Again, the ATA detects that the call is a fax, it converts the fax information to digital packets and spoofs the tones back to the fax machine. It then sends the data packets off to the PSTN gateway where the reverse occurs. The gateway converts the data packets back to fax tones and spoofs the tones to the receiving fax machine. This method can usually maintain a standard "high speed" fax at ~20 kbps.
 
#16 ·
comwave and fax

Hey all,

i have the following:

(1) dsl 3.5mpbs
(2) comwave softphone

another user posted here about being able to send and receive faxes with

comwave. if so i have been researching for months on this idea. no luck.

appears to me 1 needs intermediary service to help you get virtual fax,

phone, or fax to email account. there must be a way for those of us who can

practically not afford internet service.

please help, thanks.

chevv@hotmail.com
 
#17 ·
I don't know about using the softphone service but if you use the regular comwave service and use one of the higher bitrate codecs you should have no problem.

p.s. Why are you posting your email address? Doing so just invites more spam from spam harvesters.
 
#18 ·
Just in case you don't know yet - you can have very reliable fax2email services for free.
Callcentric offers this as a basic feature on its free accounts (in Call Treatments). Just get DID, free from IPKall, or paid, and forward calls to your callcentric account. You just got a virtual fax machine for incoming faxes.
 
#22 ·
On the contrary, sending for me (on Primus VOIP/ TBB) is a non-issue and I've used it quite few times since I got Primus TBB, receiving however, has NEVER worked for me...

I used to think the Canon MFC I'm using has an issue but I don't think that is the case...

Anyone know of a dedicated VOIP Faxing thread? I searched but couldn't find...

TIA!
 
#21 ·
Faxing with VoIP.ms

How reliable is VoiP.ms? Primus TBB recently almost never receives faxes on my phone line in Ottawa. Sending mostly still works. Vonage mostly OK in or out. This after many hours of talking to both Tech Supports & to Canon & Brother fax all-in-one call-centres. Vonage gave the most useful & accurate tips, and phd back on time to check how I was doing.

Bell was also unreliable, often gave "poor line condition". Tech support & billing service both lousy. I'll never use Bell in any form again, not even for new Palm 3 smart-phone.

I have signed up with MyFax.com, Ottawa-designed and supported fax service, rated best by one survey. Rate is a decent clean $10 a month.

(I dislike & avoid any dumb, insulting & inconvenient $xx.99 rates, on purchases & at restaurants. I would prefer VoIP.ms incoming toll-free rate to be 3c even & not the dumb, insulting & inconvenient 2.9c!).

VoIP.ms & MyFax.com could get together!

FeinDenz
 
#26 ·
Since this thread has been revived, I'll say that over the years, I've gone from eFax to Callwave to OneSuite for incoming faxing.

eFax is still some crazy price (and even crazier in Canada than US) while OneSuite is $1/mo for unlimited incoming. I have two accounts with them, my original with a US fax # and later we signed up for another account primarily to add a Canadian fax #, which has proved really helpful with places that won't dial long distance. We also found 3 zipdial (?) numbers simply wasn't enough, so we have 5-6 mobile and landline numbers spread across the two accounts for outgoing LD. We've even used it occasionally with our Primus TBB unlimited-NA line, to make calls overseas for less than TBB prices.

OneSuite is a prepaid service with a U$10 minimum. That's enough for almost a year of faxing if you don't make any LD calls, and the monthly fax charge keeps the account alive (needs some activity every 6 mos).

=aw
 
#27 ·
Help!?!

Hello,

I have been trying for some time now to get faxes to send using T.38 codec and G711/G729, and have had nothing but a world of trouble with it.

We are routing it through a Mera MVTS II 1.4 softswitch.

PSTN to PSTN. The faxes start communicating, but then after about 40 seconds the fax fails.

Can anyone offer any tips or insight on this?
 
#28 ·
I have Anveo VoIP, Linksys PAP2T adapter and Samsung fax machine connected to Linksys.
Receiving faxes goes OK, sort of. Sending faxes is more sporadic. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. Today tried many times to send 3 page fax to Europe and it failed every time. Very frustrating.
Anveo tech support says that it is what it is and that VoIP is not so good to transmit faxes.
 
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