Whole House Wiring not working. Please help.

Posts: 3 · New Forum Member Joined: Jan 25, 2008 Posts: 3

I live in a brand new home so the phone company never even hooked up our phone; so step one of the whole house wiring was already done for me. I plugged in the Vonage adapter to one of the house phone lines and it was working great for about a month. Then it just suddenly stopped working (a very quiet static almost silence). If I plug the adapter straight into the phones, it works fine. So I don't think it could be the adapter or the phone cord.

Anyone have any ideas about what I should try to get it working again?

Posts: 352 · Posted: Thu Jan 24, 2008 10:44 pm Post subject:

I could be a short in the home wiring, or a broken or loose wire or it could be a bad phone.

First, disconnect all phones. Try hooking up one phone at a time. If one works, try another until you find one that doesn't work.

If the first one doesn't work, try another on a different outlet.
Trial and error.

Posts: 1179 · Member of the Week Joined: Feb 28, 2005 Posts: 1179

is there a wire coming out of the house that is loose? I would pull it back or take it completely off the network.

If your house is new, there should be a central location where all the phone wiring meets. It could be punch down block or some other central box. I would disconnect any unused wires from there especially the one leading to the outside NIC which you do not need.

Posts: 4777 · Vonage Forum **MVM** Joined: Aug 30, 2005 Posts: 4777

Also, take a look at your adapter. The phone light should be on. When you plug the adapter into the wall outlet, does the phone light start flashing? If it does, that indicates a phone off the hook somewhere or a short in the wiring. If it doesn't flash, and the system still isn't working, that indicates an open.

Posts: 3 · New Forum Member Joined: Jan 25, 2008 Posts: 3

So I checked the phone adapter when there was no dial tone and according to the adapter it is working (no flashing). So what does open mean?

I plug the adapter into the wall outlet and about a day later it will stop working. I can then plug the adapter straight into the phone and it will work again, immediately. Then If I plug the adapter back into the wall again it works but then it starts fading to the point where there is no dial tone again. However if I wait a few hours and plug the adapter back into the wall it will work for about a day until it does it all over again.

Posts: 4777 · Vonage Forum **MVM** Joined: Aug 30, 2005 Posts: 4777

That's really weird. Which adapter are you using? Does the phone light work as you would expect? That is, it should be on solid when you're not making a phone call (and don't have phone mail). When you pick up the phone to make a call, it should start flashing. Does that work?

Assuming the light works normally, does it work the same way when you plug the adapter into the house wiring? How about when things start to fade?

If you have a simple Y-splitter, plug it into the wall plug where you're plugging in the adapter. Plug the adapter into one of its ports. Plug a phone into the other. Does this phone act the same as other phones in your house when the fade starts?

Posts: 3 · New Forum Member Joined: Jan 25, 2008 Posts: 3

Thanks for all the replies. It is currently still working right now, but once it fails again I will experiment more. Thanks again.