Issues with second cordless phone on UPC

baddler

Hi all, firstly apologies if this is in the wrong forum but I suppose it is a UPC broadband/phone issue all in one so i'll plod on.

Right so my parents have recently moved into a new-build house and about a month ago i convinced them to ditch eircom and get the UPC phone/broadband/tv deal to save a bit of cash. Broadband works fine and no issues with speed - Its on the new Thomson router and we're getting 50mb so happy with that.

The issue comes with the house phone - to explain it I should probably explain the set-up of the house. Its not huge but its over 3 floors (new build on a smallish plot of land), but there is quite substantial concrete walls throughout the house so there was always going to be a problem with wireless signal. The router itself is connected into the house "system" which in turn connects to various outlet sockets in the house and this works perfectly for the broadband. The phone lines are connected similarly from the router (from the tel-1 socket) and the main UPC phone is connected into a wall socket downstairs and works perfectly on the ground floor only (any higher and the signal deteriorates pretty quickly).

The problem is with the second phone - it is one of the Siemens Eircom 5010's and we have it plugged into a wall connection which effectively plugs straight into the tel-1 socket in the router. I have registered the phone fine but, according to UPC, the phone can only pick up a wireless signal from the main phone base (the one downstairs) so this immediately results in poor crackling signal upstairs. I called UPC again about it and tried to explain the above situation but they either didn't understand (which is possible given my explanation isn't fantastic!) or they were adamant that the second phone can only pick up a wireless signal and not work as if its directly plugged into the router.

My question is - is there a way around this? Can I possibly calibrate my second phone to work as if it's connected directly to the router and not just picking up a wireless signal from the main phone. I would have thought there was a way of doing this surely?

Any suggestions/resolutions to this would be greatly appreciated as I'm starting to feel somewhat responsible for pushing them into ditching Eircom in the first place

Apologies for the long meandering post, I hope it makes sense! Thanks in advance

baddler

hopeful bump

zg3409

I will try and help. I don't understand the problem 100%.

My understanding. You have one cordless telephone. This connects to the UPC modem and works OK. You have a second cordless telephone. This connects to a different socket on the modem and is crackely.

Cordless phone technology (DECT) works on a base station (a charger unit with a telephone socket on it) and then all other phones have a charger with no telephone socket on the base. So all other phones use the one main base for calls and their base is simply a charger.

I think in your situation you have two bases (which is not recommended) provided by two different suppliers (one UPC another Eircom). My understanding is you would like the second phone to not use it's own base but to use UPCs base.

With DECT their is a thing called "registration" which is pairing the handset to work with a base. When you buy a new set of cordless phones they are already registered with the base. The problem occurs when you buy a second phone at a later stage and want to make it work also.

There can be some quirks between different makes of phones that won't allow one make to work with another make.

So you seem to be asking can you register an eircom cordless phone with a UPC supplied base?

What you probably need is a DECT range extender. What these do is sit HALF WAY between where there is a good signal and where there is no signal. They are not compatable with all makes and they extend the range of the one main base.

Another option is to put the main base in the very centre of the house and see if it covers everything. Then run a telephone extension lead to the wall.

Does this help?

mark17j

you may need to move the base to somewhere more central, so your dect phone upstairs can pick up a better signal..you can do this by purchasing an extended rJ11 cable, to run from modem to new location. if that fails you may need to buy a better dect phone that can give better coverage. I bought a Panasonic dect phone in DID electrial when my UPC was installed and all seems to be fine, I do get a slight crackle on the upstairs phone on the rare occasion, but nothing major. voice calls are still clear. I live in a 2story house.

baddler

zg3409 wrote: »

I will try and help. I don't understand the problem 100%.

My understanding. You have one cordless telephone. This connects to the UPC modem and works OK. You have a second cordless telephone. This connects to a different socket on the modem and is crackely.

Cordless phone technology (DECT) works on a base station (a charger unit with a telephone socket on it) and then all other phones have a charger with no telephone socket on the base. So all other phones use the one main base for calls and their base is simply a charger.

I think in your situation you have two bases (which is not recommended) provided by two different suppliers (one UPC another Eircom). My understanding is you would like the second phone to not use it's own base but to use UPCs base.

With DECT their is a thing called "registration" which is pairing the handset to work with a base. When you buy a new set of cordless phones they are already registered with the base. The problem occurs when you buy a second phone at a later stage and want to make it work also.

There can be some quirks between different makes of phones that won't allow one make to work with another make.

So you seem to be asking can you register an eircom cordless phone with a UPC supplied base?

What you probably need is a DECT range extender. What these do is sit HALF WAY between where there is a good signal and where there is no signal. They are not compatable with all makes and they extend the range of the one main base.

Another option is to put the main base in the very centre of the house and see if it covers everything. Then run a telephone extension lead to the wall.

Does this help?

Don't think you got my situation exactly but you've answered my question anyway I think. So my understanding with this whole DECT system is that only one base can act as the main base and that the other ones are just wirelessly connected to it no matter what (even though they are all interconnected via the smart wiring system in the house).

I've just bought one of these in Maplins today and hopefully it will solve the problem
http://www.maplin.co.uk/dect-wireless-phone-line-extender-97658

The guy in Maplins seemed to be pessimistic about the whole thing but told me to give it a shot anyway. Hopefully it'll do the trick!

Cheers for the responses lads

zg3409

>(even though they are all interconnected via the smart wiring system in the house).

No. There should only be one base connected to the phone line. All other phones should be registered to work with that base.

The simplist way is to buy a new pair of dect phones and put the one with the telephone connection in the centre of the house. You may need to run a telephone extension lead to it.

The device you have bought is NOT THE RIGHT THING, as far as I understand. It is used for connecting a corded phone without the need to run a wire around the house.

You can buy a DECT extender which has no telephone connections on it. It is designed to be placed somewhere the signal is OK, and it then entends the signal further onwards.

Let us know if you are still stuck.

baddler

you are indeed correct sir! it didn't work so brought it back in to Maplins.

I'm now eyeing up the following DECT range extender as a hopeful solution now:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/B000WZA4HC/ref=ox_ya_os_product

As for moving the main base line to somewhere else well its not really viable, the house is a bit of a weird layout and there's no real central spot with a phone point and I really don't want to go down the road of drilling holes etc!

cheers again for your advice

zg3409

I had a look at that link. I also read the comments below given by other customers

From the comments

>he RTX 4002 will work well with Panasonic phones but NO Siemens due to encryption.
>We also dont advise buying this if you have a BT cordless phone.

As to whether it will work with you make of phone is an unknown. Also follow the instructions in the comments regarding registration. You may also need the original manual for your make of phone as registration is different on different makes of phone.

The UPC one is probably a rebranded other model.


Ideally I said you would be best to buy two new cordless phones in a pack in the same box. Then also get a DECT range extender that is proven to work with them.

Your setup has two different makes of phone, making the chance one of them will not register correctly much higher and you also have two bases with telephone sockets rather than one base with a telephone socket and a second base without a telephone socket.

Also note some newer cordless phones have a base (with no cradle for a telephone) and then two charge bases with neither having a telephone socket. This allows you to put the base wherever the phone line enters the house, and put the two phone bases somewhere else in the house.

You could also run telephone cables out a window (without drilling a hole) and in another window on another floor (without drilling a hole)

As I said the ideal setup is to have the main base with the telephone line mounted in the centre of the house.