[jaykay81]

Hi,
I'm a computer networks guy, and have somehow found myself straightening out a phone setup for one of my clients. Phone systems are not my strength, so my lingo and terminology may be a bit off.
The cleint moved office a few days ago, and shaw setup the digital phone in the new office. Shaw wired the digital phone box/modem up to a phone patch cabinet. (at least it's called that in computer networking terms). From here, there are multiple RJ11 outlets around the office. I plugged the phones in, and they get a dialtone ok. The only problem is there is only one RJ11 port for each phone.

In the old office, they had cat5e cables coming from a mini-hub. These cables were split into 2 RJ11 connections, and their digital phones plugged into both. (This gave them 3 phone lines on each phone)
My question is: where does the mini hub connect to? I see an RJ45 port on the shaw phone box/modem. I tried hooking up the mini-hub to it, but I don't get a dialtone when I plug the phone into the two RJ11 connections. Here's what I tried:

Shaw phone box > mini-hub/switch > RJ45 to dual RJ11 > phone

Have I got this wrong? Any tips much appreciated.

 

[JamesK]

Something doesn't seem to add up in your question. Are those analog phones? Digital? IP? What does "mini hub" refer to? I don't understand how you'd get 3 lines from two RJ11 jacks, unless you're using the 2nd pair on at least one of the RJ11 jacks. With digital phones, you can have as many lines as the phone supports, as the switching is done at a PBX somewhere. VoIP phones wouldn't normally use RJ11, as they'd connect to a standard RJ45 ethernet port. How many lines is Shaw providing?

 

[17671]

it looks to me as the shaw installed a Digital Home Phone modem, wired the RJ11 outlet to the patch panel, and is now providing a Digital PSTN trunk with 1 line, to the office. one line means one call, its not a pbx, not a switch, etc., just one analog line.

How would we know how many lines shaws providing? we did not order the service, that would be something you would have access to.

 

[jaykay81]

James: they are digital phones. The ports on the phones are labelled line1/2 and line 3/4, so it seems the 2 lines on one cable are a feature of the phones. The other cable just has line 3.
A mini hub is a switch, which gives you multiple RJ45 connections from one RJ45 connection.

 

[17671]

there is something missing here.

just because the cable running to the phone is Cat5e FT4, does not necessarily mean its carrying a computer ethernet signal, my home wiring is also cat5e FT6, but i can not use a computer hub or switch with it, it simply wont work, the signals are different.

there is 4 pairs in the cat5 wire, if your runing analog, you can use a pair for each analog line, so if you have 3 lines, you will be using 3 pairs. most of the time, the cat5e wire is terminated to a rj11 or multiple rj11 jacks behind the wall plates. they do this so they do not have to run more than one wire. and if you do have a cat5 wire but only need one pair,then its not a loss because you can leave them unused for future.

Hope This Helps.

 

[JamesK]

James: they are digital phones

Then, they have to be connected to some sort of PBX, somewhere. However, that "line 1/2" makes me think they're analog phones, as digital phones generally don't require separate pairs for each line. Is that mini hub ethernet or something else?

Who set up that system originally?

 

[Mango]

Did you ever get this solved? If not, post the model number of one of the phones, and the model number of the mini-hub so we can look at what we're working with, and we can try to help some more.

JamesK is correct that if they are digital phones, they must be connected to a PBX. However...I have noticed a trend to label equipment as "digital" when it's not, probably because it sounds cooler. Since you get a dial tone (on only one of the lines, correct?) I suspect the phones are not in fact digital.

m.