Friend down the road has BT line and BT FTTC. It sems to work broadband wise but te landline is - weird. Mostly if you ring it it starts off OK, then the ring tone goes all broken. If he detects it ringing and answers, the voice is a tad crackly but mostly OK.
Today he was out when I called., I let it ring. Eventually a modem answered. He has no modem connected.
Anywone have a clue as to WTF is up with the line? BT say it 'passes all tests' But they always do that anyway, don't they?
I take it he has not used one of the BT star services to forward the number to another phone?
(it would have an intermittent dial tone from his end)
He has no modem? Are you quite sure he doesn't have a fax/phone combo, because your description fits exactly with how they behave in "automatic" mode.
From the callers viewpoint:
A couple of normal rings from the PSTN
The fax answers the line, but pretends the line is still ringing by generating its own ringing tone that typically sounds raspy and at a lower level than the proper ringing tone, while it tries to determine if you are a fax or a voice caller.
sounds like someone else is connected to the same line. Had that happen once.
NT
Not knowingly,. but he is...old... and I find a lot of finger trouble on all his devices.
Mmm. I'll check that out.
Well one supposes that maybe if its a very old exchange and although bt claim its not the case, that the old pulse dial system is still on and the crackles are bad enough to misdial a call. Often you can hear the pulsing in the background if that is the case. The sort of places this seems to affect are the wilds of Scotland, Norfolk and those sort of places. Most built up areas are using relatively modern tone only gear. However it definitely sounds like either a shorting line or open circuit line which is intermittent. As broadband works then its probably not local to the home, unless there is a very specific fault, but normally if the copper nearby is clapped ot or corroded it affects the lot. I'm assuming its not fibre.
All one can do is connect a known good phone to the master and make sure its not anything in the house and when sure keep plugging away at BT Brian
Right. That fits the facts, except the one that says 'he doesn't have a fax machine'
He said he used to have one but never connected it.,
BT VDSL hubs dont do this do they?
Is it possible he is shorted to e.g a neighbours line? Sometimnes he has in the past not got any dial tone at all..
What does 17070 say his number is?
Dunno. I'll try that one later if I get round there
So:
look hard for a fax machine dial 17070
Oh. he has some ancient BT dect style phne plugged in - could that be an issue - however ISTR that the line was dodgy right at the master socket.
Easiest thing is to disconnect everything from the master socket, and then ring the line from a mobile.
If you still get the same symptoms then it is outside the house.
Cheers
Dave R
Check if there is an alarm system connected to the phone line. I recently had the same experience with mysterious modem tones answering an elderly acquaintance's phone, and it turned out that the alarm has the capability to answer modem calls for some reason.
Nick
After the number has been read out press 2 for "Quiet Line Test" and mute the local microphone if possible. Listen carefully, there should be at worst a bit of very low level hum and maybe a tiny amount of noise. Every so often the nice lady will say "Quiet Line test", she should make jump if you're listening intently to a more or less silent line.
Any crackles, clicks, splats indicates a bad joint or damage somewhere. As it's intermittent you really need to report it when it's present so the automatic tester stands a chance of testing when it's faulty. Or if there are crackles present on the call to faults point them out, they can't really dispute what they have heard.
Is it weather related? Our line is in a cable that is damaged where it passes under a track about a half a mile away. Everytime it rains it upsets the ADSL. Openreach are in the process of installing a duct under the track and should be replacing the damaged section early next week.
Also check how many devices he has plugged into the line. What you describe isn't really "ring trip" were the ringing current is suffcient to make the system think the call has been answered.
Nope. None of that. 17070 reports the correct number. It rings twice then diverts to a fax sound after about 6 seconds.
If it is an inadvertent BT service that has been enabled, how do you disable it?
*#21# will check for an unconditional divert *#001# will check for any other star services
and:
#21# to cancel divert all #67# to cancel divert on busy #61# to cancel divert on no answer
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