phunky phones
Fri Jul 28 02:29 EDT 2017
We've got a problem with our phones. It's probably some wiring gone bad someplace. We get one ring for an incoming call - sometimes - and the caller doesn't even hear a ring. I've been saying to keep unplugging things and see whether the problem goes away, and when it does, you've found the problem. In particular, go to the junction box outside and disconnect the house, and see what happens. That will tell us whether the problem is in the house (our problem) or in the phone company's line (their problem).
Somehow this can't happen until I do it. So tonight, after I finish work (i.e. after midnight) I go outside with a screwdriver, a bright light, and my (work) cellphone. I unplug the connection to the house, I dial from my cell phone, and it rings and rings. I plug the connection back in, one more ring, and it stops. This is repeatable. The problem is inside.
We've never figured out all the wiring in this house. Parts of the house are wired for 2 lines (and we used to have two lines back in the dial-up days), and in other parts the 2nd line is wired but dead. The next place we look is the wall plate in the kitchen. There's 2 standard 4-wire old-school (red/green & yellow/black, 2 lines) cables - so one in and one out, but no indication which is which. The yellow/black are cut short on one, so this is where the 2nd line gets lost. ☹ No closer to finding the problem, though.
Seems to me it's got to be a phone device, house wiring, a or phone cord. When we've disconnected it and the problem is gone, it's something we've disconnected. I'm probably going to have to pull the connections at the patch/jumper block above the ceiling in my bedroom; this seems to be the connection to the outside world.
I'm expecting I'm going to have to spend more time on this before I leave for Pennsic. ☹ It may eat the better part of a day. ☹
Saturday 15:13
I keep getting presented with problems I don't have time to deal with. One of the car's headlights is out. I seldom drive the car. No one's mentioned this until today. I will almost certainly be driving at night to get to Pennsic, and driving at night to get back from Pennsic.
Saturday 15:45
anniemal and OkCupid-buddy Brian have gone off to get replacement headlamp bulbs. (They should be cheaper per unit as a pair, and the 2nd may also be near end of life.) I'm hoping bulbs for a 25+-year-old car aren't too hard to find....
Saturday 16:14
The Mazda's headlamps are replaced. They found a pair of bulbs for $40, probably significantly brighter than the current (original?) bulbs, so replacing both was suggested so they won't be odd. Replacing them was easy; the hard part was getting the wiring harness unclipped (which I'd already done on the burned-out bulb so it was available as an exemplar at the store).
Saturday 17:29
I'm declaring the phone problem fixed. There's a patch panel in my bedroom ceiling with 5 sets of wires. I started pulling the green wires (of the red-green pairs) off one by one and dialing from my cell phone until our number would continue ringing, and then I put the other wires back on. The line in my room works, anniemal's works, the kitchen's works, and home-"office" space's works. The wire with the problem might not be going anywhere. (Maybe I've unplugged somebody's bug.)
But I haven't gotten any packing for Pennsic done yet. (And I can't load anything into the car until after I bring Grasshopper #2 back from the bike shop tomorrow.)
Sunday 02:26
The phone line wasn't fixed. If I told you "The one-ring problem is gone. I've disconnected a wire at the patch panel, but I don't know what rooms it goes to, but apparently that wire - or something connected to it - was the cause of the problem." And you've been in one room the whole time I was working, and you tell me "It works", would I be wrong to think you're telling me the phone is working in your room? The next call we get, other than tests from my cell phone, is at 00:34. anniemal picks up her phone, but it's dead (and she can't answer the call).The phone's dead.
I haven't changed anything since this afternoon when you said it was working.
I don't have a dial tone.
You said it was working before.
It turns out she had not tried the phone at all after I said I disconnected the line to one or more unknown rooms. (Somehow it wasn't obvious to her that she should check whether her phone still worked?) So that put the problem in her room, or in the wiring to the room. (Which is where I thought it would be all along.) So the line needed to be reconnected at the patch panel, and then back to disconnecting things at various junction points to see when the problem went away again. Results were inconsistent and contradictory; large amounts of dust inside things may have contributed. Eventually I removed the splitter in her room. She can use either the fancy cordless phone with answering machine, or the old basic phone that still works when the power's out.
I don't understand how other people don't understand the basic diagnostic method of removing components from a system until the problem goes away and isolating the cause of the malfunction to one item or a group of items. If you have a splitter to 2 phones, you need to go further to test each phone, the wires to each phone, and the splitter itself. Yes, phone cords are extremely simple components, and splitters are nearly as simple, but every component is capable of failing, and if the complex things don't seem to be the problem, you can't assume the simple things can't be the problem.
And this has taken more time away from packing for Pennsic. It would have taken time in the afternoon too, but it would have gone faster without having to redo furniture moves to get to the wiring. And it's always irritating to deal with cluelessness.
[This entry was originally posted as https://syntonic-comma.dreamwidth.org/908276.html on Dreamwidth (where there are
comments).]
We've got a problem with our phones. It's probably some wiring gone bad someplace. We get one ring for an incoming call - sometimes - and the caller doesn't even hear a ring. I've been saying to keep unplugging things and see whether the problem goes away, and when it does, you've found the problem. In particular, go to the junction box outside and disconnect the house, and see what happens. That will tell us whether the problem is in the house (our problem) or in the phone company's line (their problem).
Somehow this can't happen until I do it. So tonight, after I finish work (i.e. after midnight) I go outside with a screwdriver, a bright light, and my (work) cellphone. I unplug the connection to the house, I dial from my cell phone, and it rings and rings. I plug the connection back in, one more ring, and it stops. This is repeatable. The problem is inside.
We've never figured out all the wiring in this house. Parts of the house are wired for 2 lines (and we used to have two lines back in the dial-up days), and in other parts the 2nd line is wired but dead. The next place we look is the wall plate in the kitchen. There's 2 standard 4-wire old-school (red/green & yellow/black, 2 lines) cables - so one in and one out, but no indication which is which. The yellow/black are cut short on one, so this is where the 2nd line gets lost. ☹ No closer to finding the problem, though.
Seems to me it's got to be a phone device, house wiring, a or phone cord. When we've disconnected it and the problem is gone, it's something we've disconnected. I'm probably going to have to pull the connections at the patch/jumper block above the ceiling in my bedroom; this seems to be the connection to the outside world.
I'm expecting I'm going to have to spend more time on this before I leave for Pennsic. ☹ It may eat the better part of a day. ☹
Saturday 15:13
I keep getting presented with problems I don't have time to deal with. One of the car's headlights is out. I seldom drive the car. No one's mentioned this until today. I will almost certainly be driving at night to get to Pennsic, and driving at night to get back from Pennsic.
Saturday 15:45
anniemal and OkCupid-buddy Brian have gone off to get replacement headlamp bulbs. (They should be cheaper per unit as a pair, and the 2nd may also be near end of life.) I'm hoping bulbs for a 25+-year-old car aren't too hard to find....
Saturday 16:14
The Mazda's headlamps are replaced. They found a pair of bulbs for $40, probably significantly brighter than the current (original?) bulbs, so replacing both was suggested so they won't be odd. Replacing them was easy; the hard part was getting the wiring harness unclipped (which I'd already done on the burned-out bulb so it was available as an exemplar at the store).
Saturday 17:29
I'm declaring the phone problem fixed. There's a patch panel in my bedroom ceiling with 5 sets of wires. I started pulling the green wires (of the red-green pairs) off one by one and dialing from my cell phone until our number would continue ringing, and then I put the other wires back on. The line in my room works, anniemal's works, the kitchen's works, and home-"office" space's works. The wire with the problem might not be going anywhere. (Maybe I've unplugged somebody's bug.)
But I haven't gotten any packing for Pennsic done yet. (And I can't load anything into the car until after I bring Grasshopper #2 back from the bike shop tomorrow.)
Sunday 02:26
The phone line wasn't fixed. If I told you "The one-ring problem is gone. I've disconnected a wire at the patch panel, but I don't know what rooms it goes to, but apparently that wire - or something connected to it - was the cause of the problem." And you've been in one room the whole time I was working, and you tell me "It works", would I be wrong to think you're telling me the phone is working in your room? The next call we get, other than tests from my cell phone, is at 00:34. anniemal picks up her phone, but it's dead (and she can't answer the call).The phone's dead.
I haven't changed anything since this afternoon when you said it was working.
I don't have a dial tone.
You said it was working before.
It turns out she had not tried the phone at all after I said I disconnected the line to one or more unknown rooms. (Somehow it wasn't obvious to her that she should check whether her phone still worked?) So that put the problem in her room, or in the wiring to the room. (Which is where I thought it would be all along.) So the line needed to be reconnected at the patch panel, and then back to disconnecting things at various junction points to see when the problem went away again. Results were inconsistent and contradictory; large amounts of dust inside things may have contributed. Eventually I removed the splitter in her room. She can use either the fancy cordless phone with answering machine, or the old basic phone that still works when the power's out.
I don't understand how other people don't understand the basic diagnostic method of removing components from a system until the problem goes away and isolating the cause of the malfunction to one item or a group of items. If you have a splitter to 2 phones, you need to go further to test each phone, the wires to each phone, and the splitter itself. Yes, phone cords are extremely simple components, and splitters are nearly as simple, but every component is capable of failing, and if the complex things don't seem to be the problem, you can't assume the simple things can't be the problem.
And this has taken more time away from packing for Pennsic. It would have taken time in the afternoon too, but it would have gone faster without having to redo furniture moves to get to the wiring. And it's always irritating to deal with cluelessness.
[This entry was originally posted as https://syntonic-comma.dreamwidth.org/908276.html on Dreamwidth (where there are
comments).]