Best pulse to tone converter for Ooma Telo?

[Mister Mike]

I'm trying to find the best bet for a solid pulse to tone converter that will work with my Ooma Telo VOIP system.

My Ooma is plugged in to the house phone line, so all jacks are wired to it, replacing the phone company. I'd like to wire a pulse to tone converter to that same setup in the same way, so an external unit would be ideal.

It looks like the Alldav unit would have been my best bet, but that site is inactive now. That leaves Dialgizmo and OldPhoneWorks. Has anyone had success with these units and the Ooma Telo (ideally with multiple phones)? Any other external units I'm missing?

[Mister Mike]

OK, sounds line there's no good intel on this. I've gone ahead and rolled the dice on a dialgizmo, and will report my results upon receipt.

[Birdman115]

OK, sounds line there's no good intel on this. I've gone ahead and rolled the dice on a dialgizmo, and will report my results upon receipt.

I have the Dialgizmo and I'm very happy with it.  The Dial and Hold function, which allows you to dial # and*, among other things, will not work with WE 500 series phones unless you modify the wiring on the network. 

[Mister Mike]

Thanks Birdman! I read that I can't expect the # and * to work, but never heard of the 500 series tie in. Maybe I'll be in luck with my 354! Either way, I'll be happy if I can dial out, and there's no significant sound quality degradation. I can always dial out with my cordless, but whenever people notice my cool 1940s kitchen phone, they inevitably pick it up and start dialing -- so I'll be happy when I no longer have to get into the complicated discussion on my VOIP line and why my cool old phone can't dial out!

[unbeldi]

Thanks Birdman! I read that I can't expect the # and * to work, but never heard of the 500 series tie in. Maybe I'll be in luck with my 354! Either way, I'll be happy if I can dial out, and there's no significant sound quality degradation. I can always dial out with my cordless, but whenever people notice my cool 1940s kitchen phone, they inevitably pick it up and start dialing -- so I'll be happy when I no longer have to get into the complicated discussion on my VOIP line and why my cool old phone can't dial out!

The 354 is different from the 500 sets in that the 300-series circuit is arranged so that the dial completely shunts the entire telephone when the dial is operated, while in the 500-sets the induction coil and transmitter remain in the circuit and therefore present a very different resistance to the line during dialing.  Dial pulse converters have to account for this, but from past user reports these differences appear to result in varying success rates.

DTMF tone generators that are mounted directly inside the phone, and directly monitor the dial switches do not have this problem, and therefore should have no reliability problems.  This also makes it possible to more reliably recognize the finger stop hold feature for the hash and star signals.   I believe, some in-line converters use a combination of hookswitch flash and dialing 1 or 2, or so, to produce the # and *.   [I can't recall now, whether this is actually implemented in a commercial unit, at least this is how one of my own designs has worked.]

[19and41]

I have the dialgizmo on OOMA with a AE40 and a couple of trimline phones alternately.  The #* nor memory features do not function, but it does direct dial all right.

[MCCAFFRP]

Hello all,
I'm new to this forum - but I have just recently set up Ooma Telo and dialgizmo for (2) Western Electric 302A phones. They dial out fine, the sound is acceptable from Ooma and things work fine with all of my phones distributed via my house wiring (disconnected from At&T of course) except the dial-hold features don't work.  I was hoping that someone here would have suggestions for wiring mods that could be made to make those features work with the WE 302A phone. I've learned here that it is typical for Dialgizmo (Justin) not to reply to technical support requests- but he probably knows about this forum and figured I would eventually find it! Has anyone gotten those features to work on WE 302A or other similar phones? Thanks! Ron.

[unbeldi]

Hello all,
I'm new to this forum - but I have just recently set up Ooma Telo and dialgizmo for (2) Western Electric 302A phones. They dial out fine, the sound is acceptable from Ooma and things work fine with all of my phones distributed via my house wiring (disconnected from At&T of course) except the dial-hold features don't work.  I was hoping that someone here would have suggestions for wiring mods that could be made to make those features work with the WE 302A phone. I've learned here that it is typical for Dialgizmo (Justin) not to reply to technical support requests- but he probably knows about this forum and figured I would eventually find it! Has anyone gotten those features to work on WE 302A or other similar phones? Thanks! Ron.

Welcome!

A WE 302A is a manual phone, it does not have a dial at all !

If your phone has a dial with only digits, it would be either a 302B or 302F, or a 302C or 302G, if it has red digits and black letters on the dial.

[MCCAFFRP]

OK - I have two of these - so they arent 302A models, but one of the others with red dial numbers and black letters. My question is a bit of a spin from the original post - maybe I should start a new one? Anyone know for sure if the WE 302 series (with a dial) can be wired so that Dialgizmo's dial-hold features work? I see someone mentioned that the dial completely shunts the phone - that is what I noticed. What, if anything can be done about it? Thanks again.

[19and41]

I have yet to read a report from anyone that has used a dialgizmo with OOMA that has had any function above tone conversion for 1 through "o".  I know mine won't.  I'm sure if there were a solution to it, the person manufacturing and selling it would offer it.  As it is, it appears they are offering what they have.  Nada.

[Mister Mike]

I can report that the advanced Dialgizmo features do indeed work with WE 300 series phones and the Ooma unit. Because my 354 is on the kitchen wall, I put the Dialgizmo between the Ooma and the house phone wiring for a whole-home setup. So far, so good -- the 354 dials out, does #,* and redial (didn't test other advanced features that I'll never use, but I presume they work too). Now I'll have to get to work on obtaining more old rotary phones!

[19and41]

So that is an advanced dialgizmo as opposed to what is commonly available now?  Would you have a link or address where these can be obtained?

[Mister Mike]

Same old Dialgizmo. I meant "Advanced Dialgizmo Features," meaning everything in addition to the basic conversion of 0 to 9 to DTMF.

[MCCAFFRP]

Hi Mr. Mike,
Thanks for your post here - sorry for the duplicate posts. I have a WE 302, not the same phone as you do. I was asking if anyone knew for sure if Dialgizmo Dial-Hold features work with my phone. It appears that many dont understand what I am asking. There is only (One) type of Dialgizmo and its ability to dial a # or * and other advanced features not previously available with a dial phone was a large part of its allure and, I feel, supported the price. However, for some reason I cant get those advanced features to work with my Model 302 phones. My Ooma service has nothing to do with the issue, nor does the placement of the Dialgizmo. This problem exists whether or not I use a single phone connected to the Ooma Telo or connect my whole house, which has been disconnected from my previous carrier (At&T). For the clarification of other readers, I am not having trouble dialing numbers- those tones work fine, but I am not able to access the "dial-hold" features and thus cannot dial a # or a *. Thanks to all for helping!

[Mister Mike]

Answered in the other thread. Good luck!