[X4U] ISPs, DSL, dhcp vs. PPPoE, and VOIP

[Jim Robertson]

On 12/5/07 5:20 PM, "Jeff Carruthers" <jeff at carruthers.com> wrote:

> As far as sending faxes over a VOIP telephone line, I am able to do
> this using a Vonage service, but the VOIP runs over a fast 10 Mbps
> cable highspeed internet service via Cox. I was not having much
> success sending faxes with the initial service, which I believe
> provided only 1.5 Mbps. The problem, I believe, was the upload speed,
> which was a maximum of 256 Kbps. Also, if there was any serious
> downloading taking place on any computer on the network, the VOIP
> service degraded seriously and faxes would fail.
> 
> If you get one line with DSL and a second line with VOIP, both from
> ATT, it would be important to ensure that the two services are
> running separately and that you in fact are not getting the VOIP
> service using the DSL on the first line.
> 
> Given everything, my advice would be to see if there's a way to test
> the fax on an ATT VOIP line before paying for it.

That's VERY helpful. It doesn't seem that I'd save much money using VOIP
(CallVantage) for my second line (and your inference is correct; it would
run over the DSL circuit, so really there would be only one copper "pipe"
coming into the house. My interest in using VOIP was more geeky; just to
become accustomed to it. Sounds as though I should stick with with POTS for
my Fax line.

Jim Robertson
--