[P1] Faxing in OSX

[Mike Beede]

On Thursday, May 8, 2003, at 09:15 US/Central, Brian Olesky wrote:

> Can one phone line actually be split 4 times, accommodating a dsl 
> modem, a
> standalone fax, an internal modem and a home phone line? Without
> degradation?
>
> If so a whole lot of people (including me) are wasting a whole lot of 
> money
> having multiple phone lines coming into their homes and offices.
>
> Mike, do you (or anyone else out there) have some evidence, experience 
> or
> documentation that this would work?

Well, we have five phones, a DSL modem, and a fax all on the same line 
at home.
The issue isn't how many on one jack--the issue is how many on the 
*line*, since
whatever signal is delivered to your house is what you have to work 
with.

There is a number called the "ringer equivalent" associated with each
piece of gear.  When you add the numbers, they can't come to more than
a certain value.  What's the value?  I have no idea, but it must be
at least 4 (the value of 4 old-time mechanical ringers), since the
phone system is well-designed.  I think a typical REN for a newer
phone is 0.4 or so, so ten of them should be okay on one line.

The reason most people have multiple lines is so you can carry
on multiple conversations from different phones at once.   It
used to be so you could hold calls, but that's pretty easy to do
with a single line now.  The user interface was a lot better on
the old multiline phones, though -- a flashing light for each line
on hold and a "hold" button.

There's an interesting article here
<http://www.chipcenter.com/columns/fgreenhalgh/col105.html>
about ringers and power supplies, if you like such stuff.

	Mike