What will we do without POTS?

[Ktownphoneco]

Most cable companies who provide TV / Internet / Telephone service will provide customers with a modem for their internet and telephone service with a modem that has a built in pulse to tone converter, so that all telephone jacks connected to the modem can be either tone, or pulse dial.     The modem I use (RCA DHG525) provides sufficient ring voltage to properly ring telephones and subscriber sets made in the early 1900's, i.e., 317's & 293 wall sets, 295-A subscriber sets, and so on.   

Jeff Lamb 

[trainman]

Comcast phine does not support pulse dialing.

[dsk]

I do worry more when even VOIP with analog adapters disappears. Here in Norway most people I know has only mobile phones. So far adapters for analog phones are available, but all VOIP providers here has DTMF only adapters but Dialgizmo works, so it is a hope, but when will they change the system to a new standard, and the old adapters are no more, or even as easy to abandon the telephone numbering system, nobody remembers phone numbers any more so maybe we just dial a name? or the numbers becomes alphanumeric, or 25 digits??

Maybe we actually ends up with something like collectible ATA's and some C*NET system for collectors???

dsk

[mazda_matt]

If you're confident at reading wiring diagrams, the Rotatone is the way to go. Installed inside your telephone, provides * and # and works with all service providers including Ooma, Magic Jack and other USB VoIP systems. Installing on a 425 networks is just a couple wires moved around, something like the 302 or 40 can be a little more tricky, but doable nonetheless.

-MM

[kb3pxr]

Most cable companies who provide TV / Internet / Telephone service will provide customers with a modem for their internet and telephone service with a modem that has a built in pulse to tone converter, so that all telephone jacks connected to the modem can be either tone, or pulse dial.     The modem I use (RCA DHG525) provides sufficient ring voltage to properly ring telephones and subscriber sets made in the early 1900's, i.e., 317's & 293 wall sets, 295-A subscriber sets, and so on.   

Jeff Lamb

Comcast is currently disabling the Pulse dial capability. Pulse dial capability was never official on their services.

As far as the end of POTS, it isn't universal. There are telephone companies already working on the next generation of central offices. The future of POTS ironically is also VoIP while keeping the analog POTS type last mile. In fact, some companies may have already transitioned and even then, chances are, it is almost invisible to the user, even if they are using a rotary dial.

Remember, professional grade FXS gateways especially 16 or more ports will very likely support Pulse dialing. Station cards for IP PBX systems (including the TDM PCI/PCI-Express cards for Asterisk systems) support pulse dial by default (and would likely require a source code modification to disable). Rotary dial support (albiet in some cases poor) will be around in VoIP equipment for the foreseeable future as carrier and professional grade equipment will continue to support it. Consumer grade equipment usually has the limitation of Rotary dials not working, but not always. Even if ATAs stop supporting pulse dialing, it likely will be possible for the collector community to build their own ATAs that support Pulse dialing and even Party line selective ringing if they have the proper electronics and programming knowledge.

Now, this all actually leads to why the capability is not available in some equipment to begin with and the reason Grandstream has been able to restore the capability after a while (HT8XX for example didn't support it until the December 2017 firmware release). Pulse and tone dialing require different software routines to detect. DTMF detection requires detecting the tones in the audio path, pulse detection requires interpreting the changes of the switch hook state received from the SLIC (Subscriber Line Interface Circuit).

[Nessie]

I have Comcast as my phone provider, when I  first subscribed a few years ago, my rotary phones all worked.  In the last 2 years, they would not dial out any more so I bought a DialGizmo & they all worked again.  Late last year my Comcast phone modem died & they replaced it with a newer modem,  unfortunately the DialGizmo no longer worked.  I was stumped & tried different converters finally finding that the one I  bought from Old Phone Works did allow the rotary phones to dial out,  but it does not allow the # or * function.
Any one know why the DialGizmo is not  compatible but the Old Phone Works is?  I tried the DialGizmo on some of my friends phones & it worked so I know it is good.

[kb3pxr]

I suspect it either has to do with the battery voltage or the loop current of the Comcast FXS Port. Unfortunately most FXS devices are out of spec on loop current. Some devices that can provide the higher loop current unfortunately are out of spec by default (Obi is known for this, the default is 20ma, spec is 23ma minimum).

Supposedly the dialgizmo can handle the slightly out of spec loop current, BUT, that may only occur on 48 volt battery. The oldphoneworks.com converter is capable of operating on reduced power as it slowly charges a supercapacitor between calls (be careful, the supercap is a polarized device and there is no polarity guard).

In the US, the best option I've found to using digital services with older phones is BYOD. Most consumer grade services ship devices that do not have the ability to enable features (pulse dialing, high ring voltage) either through firmware limitations, lockdown, or both. Grandstream is usually good at retroactively adding pulse dialing and high ring voltage to their ATAs via firmware update as their latest HT8XX (except maybe 818) received the addition in the December 2017 update.

IMPORTANT NOTE ABOUT VOIP: Only the ATA or analog gateway your rotary phone is connected to has to even consider the type of phone you are using. To everything else you call with VoIP there is no difference between a rotary and a 10 Digit (1500 type) touch tone phone.