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Goats are the DSL!

Hey Sonic people!

I was at my mom's house the other night, and she has Sonic ADSL of some flavor. In San Francisco in Twin Peaks neighborhood.

Anyhow, she has this old type of phone that fell and got switched to pulse dialing (the old type for any phone phreaks out there) and IT FRIGGIN' WORKED!

Anyhow, it got me thinking (and I don't do that too often), would a rotary phone work on an ADSL line?

How about pulse dialing on a fiber line? My guess is NO on the fiber as there is no CO connection I believe as it's off the POTS line completely, correct?

Anyhow, any thoughts on this weird question are welcome! I'd love to get my mom an old-school rotary phone if, as testing has confirmed, seems to work! How? Why? Is it the end of the world? (you may now cue REM)

Yes, pulse dialing and rotary phones do work on Sonic Fusion xDSL! But no, they're not supported on Fiber anymore, sorry. There are some adaptors that can be used if you've got vintage equipment you'd like to keep in service, I read a review that said that this was a good one: https://www.dialgizmo.com/

Mindblown!

Thanks Dane! I ordered one! Now to find a rotary phone for my home office!

I'll post if it tests/functions!

Awesome. I've got a vintage one that I'd like to get working too. It needs clean-up of the contacts, as it doesn't generate "legible" pulses today, but works fine for receiving calls. It's a classic, I can't find a photo right now but it's still got a placard for its old phone number, "Hollywood HO 12345" or similar. So fun.

A few months ago someone was posting about pulse dialing phone.
They were collecting antique phone and reported they could not dial on the ATA.
You should be able to find their post fairly easily.

20 years ago I also remember a bank giving me a small calculator-like device that emitted the two tones for dtmf to do "phone banking".

ngufra wrote:20 years ago I also remember a bank giving me a small calculator-like device that emitted the two tones for dtmf to do "phone banking".

I remember buying a similar device at Radio Shack, closer to 40 years ago, so I could use Sprint/MCI when traveling, as well as when visiting my parents' house, where the local phone switch didn't support tone dialing. We had to dial (literally) a local 7D phone number, then put the device on the handset and key the account number and the destination phone number.

The device was also handy for traveling!

I have an ancient dialup phone (the same one I had nearly 50 years ago in my college dorm room!) and it does not work on Fusion (with 2 line ATT DSL and Sonic's VoIP dongle), but because of its power requirements rather than its pulse dialing. I don't even get a dial tone. So YMMV.

No dial tone seems weird.
Maybe it's designed to work on private circuits only or it's wired for line 2 but the ATA only has one line.

If not ringing maybe it's REN (ring equivalent number) is too big for the ATA.

wsanders wrote:I have an ancient dialup phone (the same one I had nearly 50 years ago in my college dorm room!) and it does not work on Fusion (with 2 line ATT DSL and Sonic's VoIP dongle), but because of its power requirements rather than its pulse dialing. I don't even get a dial tone. So YMMV.

Do other analogs phones work okay connected to the ATA?

dane wrote:Do other analogs phones work okay connected to the ATA?

When I had IPBB, I tried a couple of old AT&T phones with the ATA.

My classic AT&T Trimline (circa 1984, right at divestiture) worked just fine. The LED dial lit up and I could place and receive calls.

My older AT&T basic desk phone (circa 1975) did not work. I could hear a dial tone, but pressing any buttons did not emit any DTMFs. My polarity tester confirmed tip and ring were reversed. I rigged a crossover, and at that point, I could place calls.

I don't know if it was just the ATA I was using or if all of them have reversed polarity. That doesn't matter for most modern phones, but older devices may be challenged, particularly for ringing and/or DTMF.