News:

"The phone is a remarkably complex, simple device,
and very rarely ever needs repairs, once you fix them." - Dan/Panther

Main Menu

Looking for an Omniphone CoinPro

Started by timmerk, January 07, 2017, 12:35:19 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

timmerk

Hi all,

I just graduated college and will be starting grad school soon. In the mean time, I've gotten back to my payphone hobby (I collect the Western Electric 1DS types.) I've always wanted to connect them and have them function as they did in the real world - i.e. with coin signaling over a coin line. I saw on these forums that an Omniphone CoinPro could make this happen. It looks like it essentially turned "dumb" payphones into "smart" ones by emulating a coin line and adding some logic to it with a microcontroller and PC.

It looks like Omniphone went out of business 6 or 7 years ago. I was hoping someone still had some old stock of the CoinPros and would be willing to sell me one; hopefully for a low price. From what I understand, the included PhoneTracker software doesn't work because it doesn't accept registration codes anymore (internet activation?), rendering CoinPros useless from a commercial point of view.

My plan is to try to get PhoneTracker software running by doing some reverse engineering and patching of the .NET binary. From there, I will sniff the RS-232 line that connects to the CoinPro and try to reverse engineer the protocol between the software and hardware. I have a lot of experience and successes in reverse engineering serial devices before. If I accomplish this, I would write some Python code to configure the CoinPros and would certainly be willing to share. I know that DavePEI has one of these units but hasn't been able to get it working, so it would be great if I could help him for his phone museum.

If anyone has a CoinPro to sell, or knows where I could find a cheap one, please let me know. Thank you!

mentalstampede

Send a PM to forum member "Payphone installer." He said he had a few in a thread awhile back. He may still have some. Also, "DavePEI" has one and did some work on getting the software to program it up and running. He may be able to give you some pointers.
My name is Kenn, and I like telephones.

"Progress isn't made by early risers. It's made by lazy men trying to find easier ways to do something." --Robert Heinlein